Paul Laurence Dunbar

Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872–1906) was born in Dayton, Ohio, to parents who had been enslaved in Kentucky. He was the only Black student in his class at Dayton's Central High, where Orville Wright was a classmate; the Wright brothers later printed his newspaper. Working as an elevator operator, he paid to publish his first poems, and by his death at 33 he was famous across the country. His Dayton home is now part of a national historical park.