New Twitter hashtag creates a photo gallery through black history

A new hashtag has taken Twitter by storm in the face of Black History Month, asking users to post photos of all persons of color in "day to day life" throughout history. The resulting surge of posted images challenge old perceptions of race and celebrate many unsung heroes that history had all but forgotten.

Black feminist Mikki Kendall incited the crowdsourced collection of historic images by creating the hashtag #HistoricPOC.

In the ongoing Twitter feed, many users posted old photos of their family at their most happy and glamorous, and at various workplaces, showing them as candid as any ordinary person of today.

In perhaps an unexpected benefit of the Twitter movement, as users continue to highlight many historical black figures through history, many obscure and unknown figures are coming to light: ordinary men and women of color who also challenged adversity, and were able to accomplish their goals -- political, scientific, and artistic -- despite facing extreme racial obstacles.