Little Know Black History Facts

In celebration of Black History Month, I want to take a moment and share Little Know Black History facts with my fellow CurvieBirdies.

So here are a few Little Known Black History Facts:

1.

Carter G. Woodson organized the first Negro History Week Celebration on the second
week of February in 1926. The week celebration eventually became a month long
celebration which is now known as Black History Month

2.

Jean Baptiste Point du Sable, an African American from Sainte-Domingue (Haiti),
built the first permanent settlement in what would become Chicago in 1779.

3.

February was chosen as Black History Month because two important birthdays occur in February—that of Abraham Lincoln, the author of the Emancipation Proclamation, and that of Frederick Douglass, an early African American abolitionist

4.

Sir William Arthur Lewis, a professor of economics at Princeton University, was the
first African American to receive a Nobel Peace Prize. He received the award in 1979
which represents the highest level of accomplishment for an economist.

5.

M.C. Harney, an African American inventor, invented the lantern lamp, which replaced the use of candles as the primary source of lighting when daylight was unavailable. His device was patented on August 19, 1884.

6.

Nelson Mandela, South African president and political activist, was released from prison after 27 years in February 1990.

7.

Lincoln University is the oldest Historically Black University in the U.S. It was founded in
1854.

8.

Joseph N. Jackson invented a programmable remote control for television.

9.

Sojourner Truth’s real name was Isabella Baumfree.

10.

Vermont was the first U.S. territory, in 1777, to abolish slavery. Pennsylvania was the
first state to do so, in 1780.

11.

The oldest Black sorority is Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority (AKA) Inc. The first Black Greek sisterhood was founded in 1908 at Howard University by Ethel Hedgeman-Lyle.

12.

Ernest Green becomes the first Black person to graduate from Central High School in
Little Rock, Arkansas, in May of 1958.

13.

Spelman College in Atlanta is NOT the only historically black college for women, Bennett College in Greensboro, North Carolina is the other one.

14.

Xavier University, a historically black college in Louisiana, has one of the highest
success rates in the country getting their graduates into medical school.

15.

Alexander Lucius Twilight was the first African American to receive a college degree. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Middlebury College in 1823

16.

W.E.B. Du Bois became the first African American to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard. He is perhaps best known for his work in founding the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People in 1909 and helping it to become the country's single
most influential organization for African Americans.

17.

Sophia Tucker and Harriet Giles, the founders of Spelman College, used just $100 to
found this Historically Black College.

Courtesy of http://pickettsmill.typepad.com/files/black20history20101_facts-1.pdf

Were any of these facts a surprise to you?  If so, which?