Disclosure: I originally wrote this for Mamiverse.com, and I’m sharing it here with all my readers. Black History Month is every month in my home; but I wanted to acknowledge it here on my blog too.
The first time I heard of Black History Month, I was in high school. There was a display about Black inventors set up in a trophy case, highlighting some books that had been set aside in the library to mark the month. That was it. But it was just enough to pique my interest.
What I read in those books that day blew my mind. So many of the things I took for granted, were invented by African Americans—everyday items and innovations, from the simple to the profound, that have permanently changed our lives.
Here are just a few of them:
POTATO CHIPS
Imagine life without potato chips—impossible! Potato chips were invented by Chef George Crum in 1853. A customer sent back the french fries he’d prepared, complaining that they were cut too thick. Chef Crum took a potato, sliced it as thin as he could and fried the pieces. The result was the first potato chip ever made!
OPEN HEART SURGERY
Open heart surgery is commonplace today, but in 1893? That’s the year African American cardiologist, Dr. Daniel Hale Williams, performed one of the world’s first open heart surgeries. He repaired the torn pericardium of a patient with a knife wound.
MAILBOX
Ever drop a letter in a big blue mailbox? The first mailbox with a drop-hinge door was patented in 1891, by African-American inventor Philip Downing.
BLOOD BANK
Are you a blood donor? Today’s blood banks are the result of the work done by Dr. Charles Drew in the 1930s.
GAS MASK
Garrett Morgan invented the gas mask in 1912 and saved countless lives during WWI. He was also the first person to patent the traffic light.
CLOCK
Tick tock goes the clock. In the late 1750’s, Benjamin Banneker, took apart a pocket watch, studied it’s components and then created the first clock made in the U.S. He made the entire thing out of wooden pieces he carved himself.
REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS
Frederick McKinley Jones invented the automatic refrigeration system used in long haul trucks and railroad cars. He also invented air conditioning units used in military field hospitals, and portable x-ray machines.
SUPER SOAKER
Do your kids have a Super Soaker Water Gun? If so, you can thank Lonnie Johnson for creating it in 1988!
SURGICAL STITCHING TECHNIQUE
In 2010, then-15-year-old Tony Hansberry II, a student at a magnet high school for medicine, created a new surgical technique to sew up hysterectomy patients to lessen their risk of complications. 15 years old!
I am thankful that Black History Month exists. If it were not for Black History Month, I would not know about all these inventors and their innovations. I wouldn’t be able to teach my children about them.
I also wouldn’t know as much about the Civil Rights Movement. I believe one paragraph was devoted to it in our textbooks at school. One paragraph. So many lives were lost during that era and yet only one paragraph. My children deserve more than that. They deserve to know the history of the people who came before them, who paved the way so that they can be anything they want to be—even President of the United States!
I’m of Latina descent and my husband is African-American. Prior to 1967, interracial marriages were illegal in many U.S. states. If it were not for the Civil Rights Movement, I would not be married to my husband, and my children would never have been born. I owe so much to every single person who marched, so that we could all be treated as equals.
Black History Month is important because it reminds everyone of the contributions that African Americans have made, and continue to make. It is proof to my children—and, I hope, to children of all races—that they can achieve great things.
