Some stories left us in awe, inspiring us to believe anything is possible with determination and hard work.
These stories remind us that it is never too early or too late to chase your dreams.
11-year-old Kenyan sets record reading 1,178 books in three months
Racheal Nafula received the Mashujaa wa Kusoma award from Worldreader and the Kenya National Library Service (KNLS).
In three months, the 11-year-old read an astounding 1,178 books in a competition that encouraged children between the ages of 3 and 12 to read 25 books in three months.
Georgia MBA graduate turned her health struggles into an Oprah-approved company
Kristen Dunning is behind the Black-owned soap brand called Gently, which recently received a stamp of approval from Oprah Winfrey. Her journey to becoming an entrepreneur began with a desire to create soap for sensitive skin or people with skin conditions after battling with eczema for most of her life.
She created her first soap in 2019, and she developed more recipes during the COVID-19 quarantine. By 2023, $113,000 worth of products had been purchased.
She was even recognized as the 2023 Black Ambition Prize winner, receiving a $7,000 check. In 2023, she appeared on “Shark Tank,” where she secured a $75,000 investment in exchange for a 25% stake in the company. She landed the deal with Candace Nelson, founder of the Sprinkles Cupcakes bakery chain.
Nigerian barber who graduated with First Class honors
Oyinloye Emmanuel Oluwatobi recently graduated with First Class honours from the Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA).
Oluwatobi, who pursued a degree in quantity surveying, achieved this feat while juggling his career as a barber, a true testament that through hard work and perseverance, dreams can be realized.
The self-taught Cameroonian building his own planes and drones from local materials
Vidiol Tsague, a native of Bamenda, Cameroon, has been building his own planes and drones out of locally sourced materials since he was ten years old.
Even though the fighting in Cameroon’s Anglophone regions caused him to drop out of school in 2017, he continued to follow his interest, using books and online tutorials to rekindle his enthusiasm for engineering and aviation.
His talent has piqued the interest of netizens, who consistently post words of encouragement in his comments. Some government officials have also promised to help him.
37-year-old with no bachelor’s degree who turns her interest in hair into a 6-figure career
Sess Lee Cannon, CEO of Flourish Curls, is breaking boundaries in the salon industry and bringing in millions in revenue despite facing systemic challenges.
Lee gave a friend a haircut that drew compliments from the tattoo artist whom she had visited for a tattoo and it urged her to consider a career in hair styling in 2007.
At the time, she had just left Monmouth College after becoming pregnant and was working at Maui Jim in a customer service role. She leveraged social media platforms like Facebook to display her work while sending friend requests and posting photos and videos of her hairstyling transformations. In her first year of operating, Lee earned close to $30,000.
Now, her side hustle is making approximately $1 million annually.
Millionaire who was twice homeless named the UK’s most influential Black person
Dean Forbes, 46, a tech millionaire and chief executive of software solutions firm Forterro, was recently named the UK’s most influential Black person by The Powerlist 2025.
Forbes was placed ahead of Bernard Mensah, president of international at the Bank of America, and Afua Kyei, the chief financial officer at the Bank of England.
Twice homeless, he noted that his family always saw their homelessness as a temporary challenge to overcome. He noted that his humble beginnings made him more determined to break the cycle of poverty in his family.
Sarjo Baldeh, the 23-year-old Gambian paving the way for women in photography
Gambia’s Sarjo Baldeh has quickly become a rising star in the African sports photography scene after her path took a creative turn when she received her first camera, a Canon T6, as a birthday gift at 20.
This gift marked the beginning of her journey into sports photography.
Baldeh’s breakthrough came during the 2023 African Cup of Nations qualifiers when she decided to document her nation’s journey to qualify for the tournament in Ivory Coast. The Scorpions’ successful qualification opened the door for her to cover her first major tournament, where she quickly gained recognition as a standout female photographer.
Her striking images of top African players quickly gained attention, leading to profiles in international outlets such as The Guardian and Sky News.
Woman who left the U.S. to rear goats in Uganda and now making millions
Sarah Atuhaire left Uganda for the United States 13 years ago to chase the American dream but recently abandoned it to invest back home.
While in the U.S., she set up a company that provided employment opportunities for numerous individuals. But she wanted to do something different and soon realized her passion for goat farming. Inspired to establish the farm in her homeland, she returned to Uganda to start AIRE Farms Kayunga, which is located 170km from the capital, Kampala.
Today, she is a goat farmer making millions.
The first commercial pilot with no hands or feet
Zachary Anglin, a Nigerian raised in Wisconsin, was born without hands or feet.
His interest in planes and aviation led him down a path of rejection. Despite five Nos, Anglin persevered through aviation school.
Anglin had to work out how to operate a plane, which has a lot of buttons, pedals, and switches, and he had to change his sitting posture to reach the pedals on the aircraft’s floor.
Eventually, he broke through the glass ceiling by becoming the world’s first-ever commercial quadruple amputee pilot.
Dad goes from inmate to the Ivy League
Thomas T. Jones served two prison terms. But he didn’t let that stop him from earning a master’s degree from Cornell University.
He explained that he decided to change his life for the better after his son, who was four years old, visited him in prison in 2016.
He expressed, “I just really wanted to do better by my child and as a person overall…I told myself that I had five years to build myself back up, and I didn’t care if I didn’t sleep or eat. I had to make up for lost time.”
9-year-old’s kindness to ‘homeless man’ earns him free shopping spree
Kelvin Ellis Jr., a 9-year-old a native of Louisiana, decided to assist a man wearing pajamas who had his eyes shut. Ellis Jr. assumed the man was distressed outside the Baton Rogue Coffee shop.
Unknown to Ellis Jr., the man who found himself at the receiving end of the generous act was the local sporting goods tycoon Matt Busbice, who at that moment had taken a pause to say his morning prayers after stepping out for coffee.
Ellis Jr. said he had earned the money for his good grades just days earlier. Even though that was the only money he had on him, he thought Busbice needed it more.
Busbice was touched by the kindness of Ellis Jr. and invited him for a snack while reaching out to his father. Subsequently, he treated the compassionate child to a shopping spree at his sporting goods store, BuckFeather, where Ellis Jr. had 40 seconds to select items, including a new bike.
