From: medium.com/…
Black History Month began as “Black History Week” in 1926. I have previously documented the history of black history month here: “The History of Black History Month.”
There, I note that Professor Carter G. Woodson, was the intellectual and spiritual force behind the idea of commemorating and celebrating the long, sordid, tragic yet ultimately triumphant history of Africans in America.
Dr. Woodson chose the week of February 12 through February 17 to mark and observe the accomplishments and challenges of black folk in the US.
Any number of critics of the very concept of “Black History,” as well as not a few people who welcome the notion, question why Professor Woodson singled out February, the shortest month of the year, to honor the black presence in America. And, some have questioned why the good professor picked that particular week in February.
The answer, of course, is that in Dr. Woodson’s eyes, the two most significant figures in Black History (American style, that is, not counting ancient Africa itself) were Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass.
Lincoln was born on February 12, 1809, and Douglass on February 17, 1817 (although Douglass acknowledged in his 1845 autobiography, Narrative_of_the_Life_of_Frederick_Douglass,_an_American_Slave, that he himself was not exactly certain of that specific date because, depending on the whims of slaveholders and the sheer, cold “business” of reproducing (“breeding”) black people for sale, auction, etc., slave births might or might not be recorded. In Douglass’ case, there is no written record of his actual birth. In other words, Douglass’ birth date was merely a “guestimate.”
In any event, Dr. Woodson chose the week of February 12 to 17 to observe “Black History Week.”
Growing up in small-town Michigan City, Indiana (pop. 36,000, and fifty miles east of Chicago across the big lake), I remember well how my late mother, Willie Lee Dyer, also my late father, Herbert Dyer, Sr., and our church, Mount Zion Missionary Baptist Church (the oldest black church in the city) made sure that we kids knew about, observed and celebrated and appreciated “Black History Week.” Indeed, Mt. Zion conducted special “programs” and events to make sure that we understood and got the message as to “where we came from” and “how we got over.”
I thank them for that. I honor them for that.
Bryan Stevenson has picked up where many of the great black attorneys of the past have left off, including but certainly not limited to, Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall and the peerless Attorney Johnnie Cochran. Attorney Bryan Stevenson is a 21st Century reincarnation of those sorely missed giants — himself a soaring legal eagle for civil and human rights. He is the founder and CEO of the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Alabama.
From the website:
Bryan Stevenson is the founder and Executive Director of the Equal Justice Initiative, a human rights organization in Montgomery, Alabama. Under his leadership, EJI has won major legal challenges eliminating excessive and unfair sentencing, exonerating innocent death row prisoners, confronting abuse of the incarcerated and the mentally ill, and aiding children prosecuted as adults.
Mr. Stevenson has argued and won multiple cases at the United States Supreme Court, including a 2019 ruling protecting condemned prisoners who suffer from dementia and a landmark 2012 ruling that banned mandatory life-imprisonment-without-parole sentences for all children 17 or younger. Mr. Stevenson and his staff have won reversals, relief, or release from prison for over 135 wrongly condemned prisoners on death row and won relief for hundreds of others wrongly convicted or unfairly sentenced.
Mr. Stevenson has initiated major new anti-poverty and anti-discrimination efforts that challenge inequality in America. He led the creation of two highly acclaimed cultural sites which opened in 2018: the Legacy Museum and the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. These new national landmark institutions chronicle the legacy of slavery, lynching, and racial segregation, and the connection to mass incarceration and contemporary issues of racial bias. Mr. Stevenson is also a Professor of Law at the New York University School of Law.”
Each year the Equal Justice Initiative publishes a calendar, “A History of Racial Injustice,” documenting events in black history for every single day of the year. The following is this year’s list, beginning on February 12 through February 17:
- 2/12/1901: “After having rejected it in 1865, Delaware ratifies thirteenth Amendment, which abolishes slavery.”
- 2/13/1960: “Nashville students launch sit-in demonstrations to demand an end to racial segregation at lunch counters. Fisk University student Diane Nash emerges as a leader and joins the Freedom Rides in 1961.”
- 2/14/1945: “All-white grand jury refuses to indict any of six white men accused of raping Mrs. Recy Taylor in Abbeville, Alabama. They are never prosecuted.
- 2/15/1804: “New Jersey passes gradual emancipation act, becoming the last Northern state to abolish slavery.”
- 2/16/1847: “Missouri outlaws education of black people and bans immigration of all free black people into the state.”
- 2/17/1947: In Greenville, South Carolina, a mob of white men lynches Willie Earle, slashing chunks of flesh from his body before blasting him with a shotgun. Thirty-one white men charged with the murder are later acquitted.”
401 Years…and counting.