Black History Month

By Heron Boyd

In the month of February we celebrate Black History Month. If you haven’t heard of Black History Month, let me inform you. Black History Month is celebrated on February 1st - March 1st. Every year in the month of February, we look back into the past and present of our country to celebrate the strong, independent, hard working black leaders. To further explain this special month, Black History Month is an annual celebration to look back at the past achievements, accomplishments, and successes of African Americans in history. Celebrating African Americans who made a big change in our society can help keep their memory and achievements alive with each generation. To name a few we’ll begin with Katherine Johnson. She became the first black woman in NASA to calculate the path for Freedom 7, the famous spacecraft that was sent to space with the first U.S Astronaut inside of it. She soon became the first African American woman to work as a NASA scientist. Johnson faced a lot of challenges while being given the opportunity to achieve this big obstacle, she faced a lot of discrimination from her co-workers. But Katherine Johnson didn’t let that stop her, she kept her head up and accomplished an amazing milestone.

Jackie Robinson became the first African American professional baseball player to play in Major League Baseball in the modern era. Robinson faced many obstacles as well while pursuing this great opportunity he worked for, Robinson would receive death threats, racial slurs, intentional spiking, and etc. But he did not let these challenges and other peoples hate stop him from achieving his dreams.

Ruby Bridges became the first African American child to go and desegregate an all white school called William Frantz Elementary school in Louisiana. Bridges was chosen to take a test to see if she was qualified for William Frantz Elementary school, and she was the one of six students to have passed. Her parents wanted Bridges to have a great education and sent her to William Frantz Elementary school. As a little girl Bridges faced many challenges while attending William Frantz Elementary school. She had to overcome death threats, racial slurs, her father losing his job and stores not allowing them to buy groceries. But after going through those challenges, she kept her head held high and succeeded in her studies. People in our society today who've helped make a difference for African Americans include Maya Angelou and her famous poem “Still I rise” which is about African Americans triumph and victory against racism. Beyonce is a multiple Grammy winning, breaking music charts prodigy. She became the first black woman to headline a concert at Coachella. These incredible, strong, and beautiful groups of men and women have helped change the way our society thinks, opened many opportunities for other African Americans out there who have the same goals, and made history so no one can ever forget.