Black History Month Should be 12 Months Long

I’m an older white male: born, raised, educated, married and divorced in Los Angeles. I was born about five weeks before Dwight D. Eisenhower was elected President of the United States for the first time. When I was born, Brown v. Board of Education had not been argued or decided; Rosa Parks had not taken her famous seat on that Montgomery bus; schools, lunch counters, movie theaters, hell, even drinking fountains were segregated. America’s version of apartheid was in full bloom. The Ku Klux Klan was a dominant force throughout much of the South, and still made appearances in my Mom’s hometown of Indianapolis.

I was raised in a progressive home in Los Angeles. We were poor, and so we lived in impoverished neighborhoods throughout my childhood and adolescence. Throughout most of my schooling, I was a real minority: a white kid surrounded by black and brown and yellow faces. The interesting thing about how I was raised was that I was not given artificial barriers that would prevent the formation of friendships. I was taught that friendship was based on character in action, nothing more. It was really that simple for me.

My dad got a small inheritance in 1961, and we were able to move from a bare bones apartment to a good-sized home on September 7. In a wealthy area called Hancock Park, our home — -red-brick, two stories, white columns before the front door, white shutters on all the street-facing windows — -cost about $150,000. In our neighborhood, however, one which the realtor called “integrated,” the same…