Kamala Harris is among the few black women to run for president. Here is the amazing story of the first.

The sitting Republican president was unpopular and divisive. The country was a pressure cooker of partisan rage. Big names in the Democratic Party were mulling whether to jump into the presidential race: past candidates; high-powered senators; known personalities.

But then in January 1972, a political outsider announced a surprise run for the White House — upsetting the party’s power brokers and making history.

Forty-seven years ago this week, Rep. Shirley Chisholm (D-N.Y.) announced she was seeking the Democratic 1972 nomination, becoming the first woman and first African American to run for a major political party’s presidential ticket.

“I am not the candidate of black America, although I am black and proud,” Chisholm said in her announcement as supporters cheered. “I am not the candidate of the women’s movement of this country, although I am a woman, and I’m equally proud of that. I am not the candidate or any political bosses or fat cats or special interests. . . . I am the candidate of the people of America.”