Although February is designated as the "official" Black History month, I believe Black History should be celebrated more than once a year. Black History IS American History and should be a continual part of our school's curriculum.
This month I'm sharing a Black History Moment about a courageous woman who was really ahead of her time: Ida B. Wells.
Born into slavery in Holly Springs, Mississippi in 1862, Ida B. Wells fought against injustice through the written word. She was co-owner and writer for the Memphis-Free Speech & Headlight newspaper. Wells reported on incidents of racial segregation and inequality. She won an international reputation for her fiery denunciation of discrimination, exploitation and brutality. Wells would eventually publish the first statistical study of lynching called Southern Horrors and The Red Record.
Throughout her life, Wells was active in Civil Rights, the Women's Suffrage Movement and the NAACP. Ida B. Wells died of kidney disease in Chicago on March 25, 1931 at the age of 68.
In 2020, she was posthumously honored with a Pulitzer Prize special citation "For her outstanding and courageous reporting on the horrific and vicious violence against African Americans during the era of lynching."
