On Monday, February 26, a plaque was unveiled in the U.S. House of Representatives Press Gallery in Washington, DC honoring civil rights activist Frederick Douglass (1817-1895).

Best known for his support of the Abolitionist (anti-slavery) movement, Douglass spent most of his career as a journalist. He founded the North Star, an African American newspaper, in 1847.

He was the first black reporter allowed into the Capitol press galleries.

Journalists watch laws being created on the floors of the House and Senate from the press galleries.

Douglass was instrumental in urging President Abraham Lincoln to use black troops in the Civil War.

During Reconstruction after the war, Frederick Douglass kept the African American community informed about what was really happening in Congress.