Celebrating Black History Month 2019
Conservation and preservation of our natural world has not always been recognized as important science. It has been even less common to find widely diverse individuals with different backgrounds, experiences, identities and ethnicities promoting conservation and preservation.
The most famous and first African American to become a world renowned American botanist and lover of nature was George Washington Carver. He was the first black American to earn a BS degree in 1894. He devoted his life to helping farmers grow crops. He was best known for inventing more than 300 uses for the peanut and developing methods to prevent soil depletion. He received his own monument posthumously, an honor previously only given to two presidents: George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.