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Black History Month fun facts 2012

To commemorate and celebrate the contributions to our nation made by people of African descent, American historian Carter G. Woodson established Black History Week, which was expanded into Black History Month in 1976. Here are some interesting statistics about African Americans.
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Presidential Proclamation -- Martin Luther King, Jr.,

On the Martin Luther King, Jr., Federal Holiday, we celebrate the man who fought for the America he knew was possible. More>>

February Is Black History Month

Black History Month is the reaffirmation of struggle and determination to change attitudes and heighten the understanding of the entire American experience. More>>

  • SlideshowsBlack History Slide shows

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    This slide show includes images of Bloody Sunday, Brown Chapel, Dr. Martin Luther King, and one of the Freedom Ride protests.
    This slide show includes images of Bloody Sunday, Brown Chapel, Dr. Martin Luther King, and one of the Freedom Ride protests.

  • This slide show has images of Ralph Abernathy, early marches, police booking logs, voter registration and some march into Montgomery images.
    This slide show has images of Ralph Abernathy, early marches, police booking logs, voter registration and some march into Montgomery images.

  • More images from the march into Montgomery, Dr. Martin Luther King, the Klan, and a memorial to Jimmied Lee Jackson and others.
    More images from the march into Montgomery, Dr. Martin Luther King, the Klan, and a memorial to Jimmie Lee Jackson and others.

  • Images from voter registration events, a Selma roundup and more in this show.
    Images from voter registration events, a Selma roundup and more in this show.

  • Black History TimelineBlack History Timeline 1517-1866

  • c.1517 Spaniards begin importing slaves from Africa to replace Indians who died from harsh working conditions and exposure to disease. 1619 Twenty Africans are deposited at Jamestown, VA by a Dutch

  • 1705 A Virginia law forbids free blacks to hold public office or to be witnesses in court cases. 1739 44 black slaves and 30 white colonists are killed in Stono rebellion near Charleston, SC. 1770 Crispus

  • 1777 Vermont abolishes slavery. 1780 Pennsylvania passes a law to gradual abolish slavery. 1781 Blacks make up more than half of the 44 settlers who found Los Angeles. 1783 The American Revolution

  • 1790 Benjamin Banneker is appointed by George Washington to the District of Columbia Commission, where he works on the survey of Washington, D.C. 1793 Congress passes the first Fugitive Slave Act

  • 1812-1815 Free and enslaved blacks serve in the war of 1812. 1816 The American Colonization Society is founded. 1820 Blacks are banned from service in the United States armed forces. 1822 Free

  • 1830 The first National Negro Convention meets in Philadelphia. 1831 William Lloyd Garrison publishes the first issue of the Liberator, his abolitionist newspaper. Nat Turner leads a slave rebellion

  • 1849 Harriet Tubman escapes from slavery in Maryland to freedom in Philadelphia; she will return to the South 19 times to help slaves escape via the Underground Railroad. The Maryland Supreme Court

  • 1861-1865 The Civil War is fought after southern states secede amidst concerns over the preservation of slavery. Thousands of slaves who escaped during the conflict are declared "contraband of war" and

  • 1866 On February 2, a black delegation led by Frederick Douglass met with President Andrew Johnson at the White House to advocate black suffrage. The president expressed his opposition, and the meeting

  • Black History TimelineBlack History Timeline 1867-1927

  • 1867 On January 8, overriding President Johnson's veto, Congress granted the black citizens of the District of Columbia the right to vote. Reconstruction Acts were passed by Congress on March 2. These

  • 1870 Hiram Revels of Mississippi is appointed to replace Jefferson Davis, becoming the first African-American in the U.S. Senate. He served only one year. The 15th amendment, forbidding states to deprive

  • 1875 Civil Rights Act of 1875. Congress approved the Civil Rights Act on March 1, guaranteeing equal rights to black Americans in public accommodations and jury duty. The legislation was invalidated

  • 1877 The end of Reconstruction. A deal with Southern Democratic leaders made Rutherford B. Hayes (Republican) president, in exchange for the withdrawal of federal troops from the South and the end of

  • 1885 On June 25, African-American Samuel David Ferguson was ordained a bishop of the Episcopal church. The American Federation of Labor was organized on December 8, signaling the rise of the labor movement.

  • 1894 The Pullman Company strike caused a national transportation crisis. On May 11, African-Americans were hired by the company as strike-breakers. 1895 African-American leader and statesman Frederick

  • 1885 On June 25, African-American Samuel David Ferguson was ordained a bishop of the Episcopal church. The American Federation of Labor was organized on December 8, signaling the rise of the labor movement.

  • 1904 Educator Mary McCleod Bethune founds a college in Daytona Beach, Florida, known today as Bethune-Cookman College. 1905 W.E.B. DuBois and other black delegates gather on the Canadian side of Niagara

  • 1911 In October, the National Urban League was organized to help African-Americans secure equal employment and to help southern blacks adjust to the North. 1913 The fiftieth anniversary of the Emancipation

  • 1919 25 race riots take place in the "Red Summer" of 1919. 1920 On August 1, Marcus Garvey's Universal Improvement Association held its national convention in Harlem, the traditionally black neighborhood

  • Black History TimelineBlack History Timeline 1932-2003

  • 1932 In Tuskegee, AL the U.S. Public Health Service begins examining the course of untreated syphilis in black men, not telling them of their syphilis or their participation in the 40-year study. 1936 President

  • 1941 A. Phillip Randolph threatens a massive march on Washington unless the Roosevelt administration takes measures to insure black employment in defense industries; Roosevelt agrees to establish the

  • 1947 Jackie Robinson breaks the color barrier in major league baseball. 1948 The U.S. Supreme Court holds the lower courts can not enforce restrictive covenants used to maintain segregated housing

  • 1954 In "Brown vs Board of Education" the U.S. Supreme Court declares separate educational facilities "inherently unequal." 1955 Rosa Parks is arrested for refusing to give up her bus seat to a white

  • 1960 Four black students stage a sit-in at a Woolworth's lunch counter in Greensboro, NC; the sit-in movement to desegregate restaurants, hotels, movie theaters, libraries and parks spread to other southern

  • 1965 Black nationalist and former Nation of Islam spokesperson Malcom X is assassinated in New York City. President Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act. Rioting in the black ghetto of Watts in Los

  • 1968 The presidentially appointed Kerner Commission reports that "white racism" was at the root of the racial disturbances of 1967 and that the country is heading toward to separate and unequal societies. Martin

  • 1975 Elijah Muhammad, leader of the Nation of Islam, dies. After hs son renames the organization and integrates it into orthodox Islam, Minister Louis Farrakhan reclaims and rebuilds the nation of Islam. 1978 In

  • 1992 Mae Jemison becomes the first African-American woman astronaut, spending more than a week orbiting Earth in the space shuttle Endeavour. Riots break out in Los Angeles following the acquittal of