[6] MacNolia Cox, a 13-year-old girl from Akron,[7] and Elizabeth Kenny, a 15-year-old from Plainfield, New Jersey, were the first African-American children to compete as finalists in the National Spelling Bee.

[3] Due to segregation, Cox had to move into a black-only train car when she crossed into Maryland, and was unable to stay at the Willard Hotel with the other spellers.

[9] According to "family lore" and subsequent speculation, Cox lost as the result of racism, although such claims were denied at the time and remain unproven.

Van Jordan published M-A-C-N-O-L-I-A, a book of poems written as if from the perspective of different people in Cox's life, imagining her as a brilliant but tragic figure crushed by racism.

[12][11][13] Inspired by Jordan's book, Carole Boston Weatherford, a writer and critic known for controversial claims that Pokémon character Jynx was racist and "an obese drag queen" version of Little Black Sambo, published a children's picture book about Cox titled How Do You Spell Unfair?