Did you know that Black History Month was once Negro
History Week?
The first Negro History Week was established on February
7, 1926, by Dr. Carter G. Woodson, the second
African American to get a Ph.D. in history at
Harvard after Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois earned it in
1895. Woodson said that most history books
“overlooked, ignored, and even suppressed the
accomplishments of Black people.” Woodson was
both a visionary and an unusual academic,
having worked on farms and in mines before
beginning high school at age 20. He founded
the Association on the Study of African
American Life and Culture in 1915. He picked
the second week of February for Negro History
Week because it included both President
Abraham Lincoln’s February 12th birthday and
abolitionist Frederick Douglass’ chosen
February 14th birthday. (Douglass did not know
when his actual birthday was because his birth
was recorded in a property ledger indicating
only that he was born in February. His birth
was recorded in an inventory of horses,
cattle, and plowing tools. Because enslaved
people were not regarded as human, the date of
their birth was of less consequence than their
worth.)
During the 1960s, Negro History Week evolved into Black
History Month, and President Gerald Ford was
the first President to issue a proclamation
proclaiming February as Black History Month in
1976, our nation’s Bicentennial year. Ford’s
proclamation urged Americans to “seize the
opportunity to honor the too-often neglected
accomplishments of Black Americans in every
area of endeavor throughout our history.”
Since then, every President has issued a Black
History Month proclamation. On January 31st of
this year, President Biden said, “I am
reminded of something Amelia Boynton said when
reflecting on her march across the Edmund
Pettus Bridge on what would be known as Bloody
Sunday: ‘You can never know where you’re going
unless you know where you’ve been.’ America is
a great Nation because we choose to learn the
good, the bad, and the full truth of the
history of our country - histories and truths
that we must preserve and protect for the next
generation. This National Black History Month,
as we remember where we have been, may we also
recognize that our only way forward is by
marching together.”
Do we really march together? Forty-four states have
introduced legislation to restrict the ways
race matters are taught, concerned that white
students might be “indoctrinated” to “hate”
our country. Why does the truth hurt so many
so much? Enslavement happened, and it has had
an impact on contemporary life. Too few are
willing to consider ways to address and repair
ugly aspects of our history, perhaps through
reparation, restitution, and reconciliation.
Instead, many want to run and hide from our
history.
The Jesuits at St. Louis University are among those who
are running and hiding. They commissioned a
study to show their relationship to
enslavement. They acknowledged that as many as
16 enslaved people were forced to walk from
Maryland to St. Louis to cultivate a farm to
support a Jesuit mission (ironically to
“civilize” Native Americans). Now, researchers
have identified more than 200 survivors from
these enslaved people. The University of
Connecticut’s Dr. Thomas Cramer calculated the
value of stolen labor as between $361 million
and $70 billion. The university, so far, has
been silent about what it owes and what it
plans to do about it. They should take a page
from the book of another Jesuit University,
DC’s Georgetown. The remedy they have begun to
implement has been insufficient, but it is a
remedy nonetheless. Attorney Areva Martin,
retained by the Descendants of the St. Louis
University Enslaved (DSLUE), has worked
closely with Robin Prudie, the founder of the
nonprofit organization (dsule.org), wonders
why the university would go to the trouble of
documenting their troubled history without
doing anything about it.
Black History Month is an opportunity to celebrate African
American triumphs and accomplishments, and it
is also an opportunity to address some of the
structural inequities inherent in our system.
We have a crushing wealth gap that is a
function of the ways Black people have been
treated throughout history. We would be remiss
if, in celebrating, we were silent about this
history of enslavement, exploitation, and
oppression. St. Louis is not unique in using
slave labor as the foundation for its thriving
enterprise. There would be no White House,
Capitol buildings, or even a Wall Street
without the contribution of the enslaved.
Celebrate Black History Month, but make it
plain. Black History Month celebrations remind
us that Black folk are due more than
Presidential proclamations. We are due
economic justice!
