Go There To Know There

Q : Who was responsible for initiating African American History Month?  A : Carter G. Woodson Born in 1875 in Canton, Virginia, Woodson worked as a sharecropper to help support his family. He began his high school education in "his late teens," but proved to be a quick study: he completed a four-year course of study in half the time. Later he would complete his education at Berea College and earn his bachelor's and master's degrees at Harvard University, and ultimately earned his doctorate from Harvard. Later on he would become a co-founder of the Associate of Negro Life and History.  During this period of the early 20th century, the consensus among most white scholars was that the African American 'had no history': that his cultural background had been utterly stripped of him and long forgotten. However, thanks to intrepid scholars like Woodson, Arthur Schomburg, E. Franklin Frazier, and others, the rich history of African Americans became a seriou...

from docsouth.unc.edu "...I do earnestly desire to arouse the women of the North to a realizing sense of the condition of the two millions of women at the South, still in bondage, suffering what I suffered, and most of them far worse. I want to add my testimony to that of abler pens to convince the people of the Free States what Slavery really is. Only by experience can any one realize how deep, and dark, and foul is that pit of abominations. May the blessing of God rest upon this imperfect effort in behalf of my persecuted people" (Jacobs 281). Harriet Jacobs was born in Edenton, North Carolina in 1813 to Elijah Knox and Delilah Horniblow, both slaves. In accordance with the edict of the time, Harriet and her brother, John "followed the condition of their mother" in slavery. After Delilah died when Harriet was a mere six years old, the little girl went to live with her mother's mistress, Margaret Horniblow. The white mistress taught Harriet to read, a...