...BlAcK hIsToRy MoNtH...

Friday, March 2, 2012

As March has quickly approached, i am sad to see how fast this year is moving!
A previous post i shared that each day in February, i post black history facts on my Facebook status. I started this a few years ago and i have gotten a lot of positive feedback from people enjoying me sharing the facts that i find on my status.  I did not even consider that soooooo many people would even care about the facts that i shared but apparently some people awaited each day to see what i would share!  I am happy that i was able to use social media to teach my peers something new.

As promised, i am going to post some Black History Facts that i learned and shared over the past month. Hope that you guys learn something as well :-) Enjoy!

On this day (Feb 1st)  in 1865 the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which abolished slavery, was adopted by the 38th Congress. 

On this day (Feb 2nd) in 1915 Biologist Ernest E. Just receives the Spingarn medal for his pioneering in cell division and fertilization. Also, Scientist and mathematician Benjamin Banneker is credited with helping to design the blueprints for Washington, D.C


On this day 9Feb 3rd) in 1956 Autherine J. Lucy becomes the first black student to attend the University of Alabama (she later graduated getting a master’s degree in education). 

On this day (Feb 5th) in 1884, W. Johnson patented the Egg Beater.

Nathaniel Alexander was the first to patent the folding chair. His invention was designed to be used in schools, churches and at large social gatherings


After the success of Negro Digest, publisher John H. Johnson decided to create a magazine to depict the positive side of black life and black achievement. The first issue of his publication, Ebony, sold out in a matter of hours. An additional 25,000 copies had to be printed immediately to meet the demands of the public


Thomas L. Jennings was the first African-American to receive a patent in 1821. It was for a dry-cleaning process in 1821. He used the money earned from the patent to purchase relatives out of slavery and support abolitionist causes

History has credited Thomas Edison with the invention of the light bulb, but fewer people know about Lewis Latimer's innovations toward its development. Until Latimer's process for making carbon filament, Edison's light bulbs would only burn for a few minutes. Latimer's filament burned for several hours


 Henry Brown created what is now known as a "strongbox", a metal container to store money and important papers that could be locked with a key. 


Both Condoleezza Rice and Martin Luther King, Jr. started college when they were just 15 years old. She studied political science at the University of Denver; he majored in sociology at Morehouse College in Atlanta. 


The hair brush, lawn mower, cellphone, refrigerator, and the air conditioner were all the fruits of African-American inventors

Granville Woods invented numerous devices relating to the railroad including a system of overhead electric conducting lines, air brakes and a telegraph system that allowed communication between moving trains. And Joseph Winters invented a fire escape ladder in 1878


David Crosthwait, Jr., who created the heating system for New York City's Radio City Music Hall, holds 39 U.S. patents and 80 international patents pertaining to heating, refrigeration and temperature regulating systems


The first sociology department in the U.S. was established by educator and civil rights leader, W.E.B. Du Bois. 


Sarah E. Goode invented a bed that folded up into a cabinet in 1885. Contrary to popular belief, she was not the first African-American woman to receive a patent, but the second


James West's research in sound technology led to the development of foil-electret transducers used in 90 percent of all microphones built today and in most new telephones being manufactured. West holds 47 U.S. and more than 200 foreign patents on microphones and techniques for making polymer foil-electrets. He was inducted into the National Inventor's Hall of Fame in 1999


Lewis Temple revolutionized the whaling industry with his invention of the toggle harpoon in 1848. 


Radio personalities Hal Jackson and Percy Sutton co-founded the Inner City Broadcasting Corporation (ICBC). They also acquired WLIB, which became the first African-American owned and operated station in New York


Mark Dean along with his co-inventor Dennis Moelle created a microcomputer system with bus control means for peripheral processing devices. This invention allows the use of computer plug-ins like disk drives, speakers, scanners, etc


Hirman R. Revels of Mississippi was sworn in as the first Black U.S. senator and first Black representative in Congress in 1870


African-American inventor Garrett Augustus Morgan created the gas mask—then became renowned for using his mask to save workers trapped in a toxic fume-filled tunnel


Before he was a renowned artist, Romare Bearden was also a talented baseball player. He was recruited by the Philadelphia Athletics on the pretext that he would agree to pass as white. He turned down the offer, instead choosing to work on his art


Tice Davids, a runaway slave from Kentucky, was the inspiration for the first usage of the term “Underground Railroad.” When he swam across the Ohio River to freedom, his former owner assumed he’d drowned and told the local paper if Davids had escaped, he must have traveled on "an underground railroad." (Davids actually made it alive and well.) 


Architect Paul Williams mastered the art of drawing upside down so that he could sit across from (not next to) white clients who didn’t want to sit side-by-side with a black person

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