High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Ida Bell Wells-Barnett (July 16, 1862 – March 25, 1931) was an African American journalist, newspaper editor and, with her husband, newspaper owner Ferdinand L. Barnett, an early leader in the civil rights movement. She documented lynching in the United States, showing how it was often a way to control or punish blacks who competed with whites. She was active in the women`s rights and the women`s suffrage movement, establishing several notable women`s organizations. Wells was a skilled and persuasive rhetorician, and traveled internationally on lecture tours.