As many of you know Black History Month is celebrated the entire month of February to highlight Black achievements as well as struggles to achieve. Black History is American History but is often hidden in the American History books.
The theme for 2023 Black History Month is Black Resistance. According to the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH):
African Americans have resisted historic and ongoing oppression, in all forms, especially the racial terrorism of lynching, racial pogroms, and police killings since our arrival upon these shores. These efforts have been to advocate for a dignified self-determined life in a just democratic society in the United States and beyond the United States political jurisdiction. The 1950s and 1970s in the United States was defined by actions such as sit-ins, boycotts, walk outs, strikes by Black people and white allies in the fight for justice against discrimination in all sectors of society from employment to education to housing. Black people have had to consistently push the United States to live up to its ideals of freedom, liberty, and justice for all. Systematic oppression has sought to negate much of the dreams of our griots, like Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston, and our freedom fighters, like the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Septima Clark, and Fannie Lou Hamer fought to realize. Black people have sought ways to nurture and protect Black lives, and for autonomy of their physical and intellectual bodies through armed resistance, voluntary emigration, nonviolence, education, literature, sports, media, and legislation/politics. Black led institutions and affiliations have lobbied, litigated, and achieved success. https://asalh.org/black-history-theme
This year, Friends of Dean Park, Inc. (FODP) again sponsors an exhibit at the Winston County Library with photos and biographies of Black achievers, African artifacts, including fabrics, fashions, art, and articles about organizations and people who resisted suppression.
One local honoree is Harvey Darden; Class of 1964 of the Louisville Colored High School and president of the Winston County Branch NAACP from 1988-2004. More information will be published about his legacy at a later date. Deborah Holmes and her grandsons who participated in the Black Lives Matter Rally that was held at the Louisville Coliseum and the First Presbyterian Church, Saturday, July 20, 2020 will be acknowledged. Also, Lawrence Sangster who was the organizer of the Black Lives Matter Rally will be acknowledged.
FODP has for 17 months provided a friendly location for residents to get their Covid-19 vaccine without appointments. During Black History Month, FODP will have a Covid-19 Event on February 16, 2023, location to be announced. Many African American were/are hesitant to take the vaccine because of past incidents of misusing them for experiments. However, Dr. Kizzmekia Shanta Corbett, a black scientist, came out and publicly denounced that this vaccine was anything like the Tuskegee study with Black men who had syphilis. The participants of the Tuskegee study were not offered available treatment even after penicillin became widely available. The Covid-19 vaccine is available to all that want it unless there are medical reasons for them not to take it. Dr. Corbett was 34 years old when she developed Moderna. She is definitely young gifted and black and will be studied in history for years to come. The Bivalent Booster will be available only after doses 1 and 2 have been taken. The other two boosters are not a requirement before taking the Bivalent Booster, which targets the omicron BA.4, and BA.5 sub-variants.
FODP members, invite all of you to the Winston County Library to see the exhibit from February 1 – February 28. If you would like a tour for a class or group please call Elmetra Patterson, 510.672-2106. A reception will be held on February 25, 2022, 10 a.m. – 12 p.m. Tours will follow until 1 p.m. There will be refreshments.
