Opal Tometi, Alicia Garza, and Patrisse Khan-Cullors

Writer and community activist Alicia Garza (born 1981) was in Oakland in 2013 when she learned that the man who killed unarmed Black teenager Trayvon Martin had been acquitted. She wrote on Facebook, “Our lives matter, Black Lives Matter." Los Angeles artist and activist Patrisse Khan-Cullors (born 1984). Los Angeles artist and activist Patrisse Khan-Cullors (born 1984) read Garza’s post and added the hashtag “BlackLivesMatter." With the help of New Yorker Opal Tometi, a civil rights movement was born—one proud to have many faces rather than a single leader.