“We cannot afford to settle for being just average; we must learn as much as we can to be the best we can. The key word is education — that’s knowledge — education with maximum effort.”

— Bill Cosby

History is what people are made of. Four days from now will signal more than the first day of February. For many it will also mean the beginning of Black History Month.

If someone was to ask me why is there a Black History Month, they would be in for an answer they may not be ready for.

First, after I finished looking at them like they were crazy, and the laughter ceased coming from my gut, I would apologize for embarrassing them and tell them that they better have a seat ’cause this might take a while.

I can give only one answer to this question. Simply put, black history is American history.

In fact, there would be no American history without the efforts of any of the castrated, chastised, circumcised or ostracized groups in American history.

This country was founded and constructed by many different people, and not all of them were powdered wig-wearing, slave-owning, plantation-owning, white men.

If one (me) wanted to prove his point, he could easily take a journey through history and take a look at what contributions black people have made to history — not just American but world history as well.

It would be easy to look at classic literature. For some reason the name Alexandre Dumas comes to mind. Didn’t he write that book, “The Three Musketeers” and that other one, “The Man in the Iron Mask”?

But that would be too easy, so I won’t go there. I am not gonna say anything about Aesop and his fables, ’cause that too would be to easy.

I’m not gonna mention the fact that the great composer Ludwig Van Beethoven was a man of color. I mean c’mon that is way too easy! So I’m not going there.

History is made everyday. Somewhere on this planet, at this moment, history will be made. I might even be making it now. History is more than what we find in the books they give us in class. History is more than the questions we answer on that test so we can get that grade. History is who we are, where we have been, who we were and where we are going.

Maybe the fact that on April 19, 1775, five black men — Peter Salem, Samuel Craft, Caesar and John Ferit (father and son) and Pomp Blackman — were among the Minutemen who stood against the British at Concord Bridge is irrelevant. Maybe it’s not even important, but it is still history.

What about Johnson Whittaker, the first black Cadet admitted to West Point, or Samuel L. Gravely, Jr., the first African-American to become an Admiral in the U.S. Navy.

Are their accomplishments unimportant? Maybe, to some. Nevertheless they are still historical.

Think about this: have you ever used or heard the phrase “The real McCoy”? Well if so, it was coined after black inventor Elijah P. McCoy who received more than 70 patents involving the lubricating of machinery.

Next time you flip that switch, don’t let Thomas Edison light the way. Instead let Lewis Latimer, a technician in Edison’s lab enlighten you. After all it was his filament that brought about the incandescent light bulb, after Edison’s failed.

Are you starting to feel like maybe those history books aren’t telling the whole story?

Well don’t feel that way. They tell a story, it’s just a partial one.

Saying black history begins with the Emancipation Proclamation, is like saying that American history started with the Civil War or world history began with the Spanish Inquisition.

The only historical figures in black America are not limited Martin, Malcolm, Jesse, O.J., Jackie and Michael.

There’s also Granville T. Woods, Garrett Morgan, Dr. Charles R. Drew and Dr. Daniel Hale Williams.

Think about these men the next time you wonder how trains stop, stop at a traffic light, need a blood transfusion or know someone who has open-heart surgery.

How can we think about Carol Moseley Braun without recognizing Shirley Chisolm?

Can we laugh at Whoppi Goldberg until we laugh at “Moms” Mabeley? Is it right to enjoy Terri McMillain without reading Zora Neale Hurston or Phyllis Wheatley?

Whitney Houston can’t make us cry and feel joy until we have heard the joy and pain sung by Billie Holiday.

When Dr. Carter G. Woodson, a black educator, founded “Negro History Week” in the early 1900s, it was to educate blacks about themselves. Now Black History Month is doing the same.

The fact is that in this country, the African-American’s contribution to history has been misrepresented, misinterpreted, unreported and misunderstood for years.

We need to remember the Motown’s, the Provident Hospitals and the Tuskegee Airmen. Without forgetting about the Tuskegee Experiment and The Middle Passage (Black Holocaust).

That’s why we have a Black History Month.

But hey, that’s just my opinion.

Holla if ya hear me!

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Rhaason Mitchell is a junior in journalism and mass communication from Chicago.