Transcript
Kelly Therese Pollack (0:00)
This is Unsung History, the podcast where we discuss people and events in American history that haven't always received a lot of attention. I'm your host, Kelly Therese Pollack. I'll start each episode with a brief introduction to the topic and then talk to someone who knows a lot more than I do. Be sure to subscribe to Unsung History on your favorite podcasting app so you never miss an episode. And please tell your friends, family, neighbors, colleagues, maybe even strangers to listen to.
Narrator (0:37)
Abolitionist and statesman Frederick Douglass never knew when his birthday was. There was no written record of his birth, and his previous enslavers had told him it might have been February of two different years. He wrote in a letter in 1891. It has been a source of great annoyance to me never to have a birthday. He chose to celebrate his birthday on Valentine's Day, February 14th. After Douglas's death in 1895, prominent black individuals sought to commemorate his remarkable life. Educator and activist Mary Church Terrell suggested to the District of Columbia Board of Education, on which she served, that Black children in D.C. should celebrate February 14th as Douglas Day to learn about his life and to hear his speeches. In her remarks at the first Douglas Day celebrations, Tyrell described Douglass as a leader, quote, who set a high standard of life and dared to live up to it in spite of opposition, criticism and persecution. By the time Carter G. Woodson earned his PhD at Harvard University in 1912, Douglas Day was already observed nationally. Woodson was born in 1875 to formerly enslaved parents, and he worked as a coal miner in West Virginia before attending Berea College in Kentucky and then the University of Chicago, where he earned his MA in European History in 1908. At Chicago and at Harvard, Woodson's professors made it clear that they did not believe that black people had a history worth studying. Woodson disagreed, and in 1915 he founded the association for the Study of Negro Life and History, now known as the association for the Study of African American Life and History. His co founders were George Cleveland Tall, W.B. hartgrove, Alexander L. Jackson, and James E. Stamps. In 1916, Woodson and the association launched the Journal of Negro History. An address by Woodson helped to kick off an initiative by the Omega Sci Fi fraternity chapters to celebrate Negro History and literature week from 1921 to 1924. But Woodson recognized that an initiative run through the association for the Study of Negro Life and History would have broader reach than one organized by a fraternity. In February of 1926, Woodson created and launched the inaugural Negro History Week to counter anti black narratives and to study and preserve black achievements, and not just those by luminaries like Douglass. Situating Negro History Week in February, though, was a direct nod to the tradition of Douglas Day that had already been established. The celebration of Negro History Week grew quickly as it spread through existing communities, including black newspapers, black teacher networks, historically black colleges and churches. By the early 1930s, Negro History Week was widely celebrated in black segregated schools, and generations of black students grew up with these commemorations. In February 1949, scholar and activist W.E.B. du Bois, in a speech to the Workers Fellowship of of the Society for Ethical Culture in New York City, praised Woodson's efforts, saying, quote, this man standing almost alone, has virtually compelled the people of the United States at least once a year to recognize the fact that a tenth of their population has developed a history worthwhile knowing, unquote. He further noted that Negro History Week brought, quote, to the attention of Negroes themselves, to let them know that despite the silences and omissions and the distortions of history, Negroes in America have done a remarkable job in the personalities in which they have given to the nation, in the contributions they have made to the nation's culture, into the expressions which they have contributed to American art. At the annual meeting of the association for the Study of Afro American Life and History in October 1875, noting that both the 50 year anniversary of Negro History Week and the 200th anniversary of American independence would fall the following year, the association decided that in 1976 they would expand the celebrations to the entire month of February, declaring the theme in 1976 To Be America for all Americans. In fact, in some places, black history was already a month long celebration. For instance, the black students at Kent State University in Ohio had established their own Black history month in 1969. J. Rupert Pickett, a professor of history at Virginia State University and executive director of the association for the Study of Afro American Literary Life and History, drafted a proclamation that they sent to President Gerald Ford's administration in hopes that he would issue a presidential proclamation declaring February Black History Month. Such a proclamation requires congressional support, and instead Ford offered a presidential message on February 4, 1976. Although the message confused Woodson's birth year with the year the association was founded, and it failed to acknowledge the harms done to black people in the United States, Ford did write, quote, I urge my fellow citizens to join me in tribute to Black History Month and the message of courage and perseverance it brings to all of us, unquote. In February 1986, President Ronald Reagan issued Proclamation 5443 which declared national Black Afro American History Month as requested by Congress in Senate Joint Resolution 74. The 1986 proclamation opened by describing black history as a book rich with the American experience, but with many pages yet unexplored. Unlike Ford's earlier message, it acknowledged the suffering of black people in American history, explaining, the purpose of Black History Month.
