'Famous Americans': The Changing Pantheon of American Heroes

Meeting at the Wabash Avenue Young Men’s Christian Association on Chicago’s South Side on September 9, 1915, four African American men laid the foundation for the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (asnlh), the first scholarly society promoting black culture and history in America. The force behind that initiative was Carter G. Woodson, the only black of slave parentage to earn a history Ph.D. from Harvard University. A tireless institution builder, Woodson not only kept the asnlh afloat through years of financial uncertainty, but also established the Journal of Negro History in 1916 and served as its editor until his death in 1950. Woodson authored and edited scores of publications—scholarly monographs, textbooks, pamphlets, newsletters, circulars, and reports—all aimed at spreading knowledge about blacks’ contributions to American history. Yet, even more than his prodigious list of publications, the initiative for which Woodson is best known was inspired by a trend in the 1920s when civic organizations would devote weeks of the calendar to promote special causes, such as Boy Scout Week, Clean-Up Week, or Good Health Week. In 1926, Woodson designated the week in February that included the birthdays of Abraham Lincoln (February 12) and Frederick Douglass (February 14) as “Negro History Week.”1 Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, black America celebrated Negro History Week with speeches, parades, and educational events. But not until the 1960s did white America take much notice. During the 1940s and 1950s, mainstream textbooks virtually ignored black Americans except in their faceless guise as slaves. “Blacks were never treated as a group at all,” wrote Frances FitzGerald. “They were quite literally invisible.” Textbook