(John Phillips/Getty Images)
By Isoken Osagie
This month is the 45th anniversary of celebrating Black History Month, but how did the month-long acknowledgment of Black histories and stories in the U.S. begin?
Historian, educator and scholar Dr. Carter G. Woodson has been widely credited for Black History Month and is referred to as the Father of Black History.
Woodson was born in 1875 to former slaves, Anne Eliza (Riddle) and James Henry Woodson and spent his childhood working in coal mines in West Virginia. He later earned his master's degree in history from the University of Chicago and got a Ph.D. from Harvard University.
As a teacher and school administrator, Goodson established the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History and founded the group's esteemed publication, the Journal of Negro History after being dissatisfied with how Black histories were accounted for in U.S. history textbooks and the lack thereof.
In 1926, Woodson developed Negro History Week (the second week of February) as he believed, "the achievements of the Negro properly set forth will crown him as a factor in early human progress and a maker of modern civilization," per CNN — and in 1976, Negro History Week was expanded into Black History Month.
So why the second week of February?
Woodson chose the second week in February because it was when abolitionist and civil rights leader Frederick Douglass as well as President Abraham Lincoln, who signed the Emancipation Proclamation abolishing slavery were born. Their birthdays were on Feb. 14 and 12 respectively.
It was in a way an ode to the influential work these two men did to advance the rights of the Black American population.