Reaping the benefits of black brilliance

JACKSONVILLE — February is Black History Month, an observance which should be meaningful for everyone - regardless of their own skin color - because each of us has benefitted from the advancements made by some of history’s greatest black minds.

So I thought I would take this opportunity to list only a few of the countless black scientists and inventors whose contributions have had a lasting impact, not only on the lives of blacks, but on all of American life.

George Washington Carver is best known for his extensive work with the peanut, but he also developed uses for other crops too – like sweet potatoes, soybeans and pecans. As a result of his botanical work, Carver produced adhesives, dyes, cooking oil, axle grease, ink, medications, a crop rotation method that replenished the soil depleted by cotton production and many, many other uses. Carver’s inventions had a significant positive impact on the agricultural output of farmers in the South during the early part of the 20th century, and many of his discoveries are still in use today.

Dr. Charles Richard Drew was an American physician who first thought of the idea for the blood bank, and played a part in the perfection of the blood transfusion. His system for the long-term preservation of blood plasma has saved millions, if not billions, of lives since he first pioneered it in the 1940s.

Three of the original nine patents in IBM’s first personal computer belong to Dr. Mark Dean, a black man whose work has led to many of our modern technological advancements. Dean currently holds a total of more than 20 patents.

In 1853, Chef George Crum invented the potato chip when a patron complained that his establishment’s French fries were too thick. Crum sliced his fries so thin that they couldn’t be eaten with a fork, and the first potato chip was born. And they have been clogging our arteries with their deliciousness ever since.

Garrett Morgan not only patented the world’s first gas mask, but he personally used his invention to help save a group of Pennsylvania miners during an accidental shaft explosion. His design was later adopted by the U.S. military. Morgan was also the first person to ever patent a traffic signal.

Not only was Lewis Howard Latimer a member of Thomas Edison’s research team, but he later improved upon the newly-invented incandescent light bulb by creating the first carbon filament to use with it.Clatonia Dorticus was a prolific black inventor whose creations spanned many different areas of life. One of his patents was for a machine that applied dyes to the soles and heels of shoes, another was a leak stopper for hoses and yet a third was a contraption that helped develop photographs.

George Edward Alcorn used his master’s degree in nuclear physics and his doctorate in atomic and molecular physics when he invented the Imaging X-ray Spectrometer – a device used by scientists to determine the molecular composition of a material.

Frederick McKinley Jones had more than 40 patents in the field of refrigeration. Kenneth J. Dunkley created the first 3-D glasses. Marie Van Brittan Brown invented the closed-circuit television security system. Benjamin Banneker constructed the first clock made in America out of wood. Lonnie G. Johnson designed the Super Soaker squirt gun. The inventions of Elijah McCoy, who is best known for his steam engine lubricator, were of such high quality that the expression “the real McCoy” entered common American parlance.

Now I’ve heard a number of people over the last few weeks making jokes at the expense of Black History Month, and such derision is tragic. Through innovation, these men and women strived towards and achieved a step forward for all of humanity. For that, they have earned the appreciation of every human being – be they red, yellow, black or white.

And I have a strong feeling that the next time one of you finds yourself in a situation where your life depends on a gas mask or a blood transfusion, you likely won’t find the ingenuity of these black innovators to be quite such a laughing matter.

At this point, it seems like my regular readership falls into two distinct groups – people with political and moral convictions roughly similar to my own and Terry Thompson.

For those of you reading this because you hold dear the same conservative social and fiscal values that I espouse, I would encourage you to pick up and peruse a copy of the Texas Eagle Forum’s 2010 voter’s guide before heading off to the polls on Tuesday.

Each year TEF, the state’s leading pro-family movement, publishes a guide which measures each incumbent’s conservatism based on their actual voting record and lists each challenger’s stances on a number of political issues of importance to values voters. It’s a great way to find out if your leader is voting your values while in Austin or just using them as a campaign ploy back home.

And please remember to take the time to vote. I can promise you that most of us will have nothing more important to do this Tuesday. If you don’t vote, you have nothing to complain about.

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Column by Kelly Young

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