African Americans has played vital role in developing North America. Because of the significant roles Africans and African Americans have played in United States, the month of February is dedicated as Black History Month. During this month our focus will include three major events that took place in the United States. First, our focus will be the revolt. Secondly, our focus will be the progress. Finally, our focus will be in challenges ahead. The climax will be a brief discussion on our website the need for Black History Month and those like Dr. Carter Woodson (The Father of Black History) through their intellectual struggles brought black history to the forefront.

During the 1960s the nation’s black inner cities were swept by violent outbreaks. Their basic causes were long-standing grievances—police insensitivity and brutality, inadequate educational and recreational facilities, high unemployment, poor housing, and high prices. The fighting that took place was mainly between black youths and the police. Hundreds of lives were lost, and tens of millions of dollars’ worth of property was destroyed. The most serious disturbances occurred in the Watts area of Los Angeles, Calif., in July 1965 and in Newark and Detroit in July 1967.

During the 1960s black nationalists and black organizations were created, among them the Revolutionary Action Movement, the Deacons for Defense, and the Black Panthers party. Under some leaders more radical views were formed. Some of the organizations leaders were arrested, and others fled the country. This loss of leadership seriously weakened some of the organizations.

The slogan of “Black Power”— attempts by African American to maximize their political and economic power became popular in the late 1960s. It was first used by Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Touré) in June 1966 during a civil rights march in Mississippi.

Among the outstanding modern advocates of black power was Malcolm X, who rose to national prominence in the early 1960s as a minister in the Nation of Islam, or Black Muslim movement. Malcolm broke with the leader of the Black Muslims, Elijah Muhammad, and founded the Organization of Afro-American Unity before he was assassinated in February 1965.

The Black Power movement was stimulated by the growing pride of black Americans in their African heritage. This pride was symbolized most strikingly by the Afro hair style and the African garments worn by many young blacks. Black pride was also manifested in student demands for black studies programs, black teachers, and separate facilities, and in an upsurge in African American culture and creativity. The new slogan—updated from Harlem Renaissance poet Langston Hughes—was “black is beautiful.”

The Vietnam War, in which black soldiers participated in disproportionately high numbers, tended to divide the black leadership and divert white liberals from the civil rights movement. Some NAACP and National Urban League leaders minimized the war’s impact on the black home front. A tougher view—that America’s participation had become a racist intrusion in a nonwhite nation’s affairs—was shared by other black leaders, including Dr. Martin Luther King. He organized the Poor People’s Campaign, a protest march on Washington, D.C., before he was assassinated in Memphis in April 1968.

The civil rights movement underwent historical changes by 1970. President Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society program established as a War on Poverty, greatly expanded into the welfare programs. Legislative goals had largely been achieved— opening up opportunities for blacks in schooling, housing, and the labor force. This created a new emphasis on affirmative action programs — the effects of historical discrimination by assuring present opportunities for minority. Sometimes it became necessary to resort to quota systems in school admission and job hiring, a policy that was denounced by some nonblacks as reverse discrimination. Regardless of these programs, by the early 21st century many blacks were still living in poverty in urban ghettos. Nevertheless, many black families have risen into the middle and upper middle classes. Read more about progresses and outstanding contributions made by Africans and African Americans as we Celebrate Black History Month.