What About Everyone Else?:

Spotlight on Dr. George Franklin Grant

Often you wonder,
If only half the country was enslaved,
Then half the country was free...
And if the free were free
Why is it that we only hear about the slave?
While the south relegated us to fields,
Harvard was graduating black PhDs
And while the south was beating us in the ditch,
Blacks up north were moving ahead--
But history teachers have us believing
Slavery is our only legacy:
Three-fifths of a person,
Not whole individuals...
How can that be?
First shot in the revolutionary war
And still bound to the image
Some alter-er of history created
To blind us of our own accomplishments
Our true strength, our true potential

Dr. George Franklin Grant

Dr. George Franklin Grant received his degree from the Harvard Dental School in 1870 and went on to become the first black professor at Harvard. Along with practicing dentistry and educating others on the practice, Grant's love of golf led him to invent the wooden tee.^[1] While it is unknown who the first black to take up the sport was, it is speculated that it happened on the coast of South Carolina. With one of the first golf clubs to appear in the US being located in Charleston, SC, thus leaving people to assume that slaves acted as caddies. From studying history, there is reason to argue that blacks were involved with golf from its birth in the states.^[2]

References

1. "George Franklin Grant. Center for the History of Medicine; visited February 2014
2. Calvin H. Sinnette. "Forbidden Fairways: African-Americans and the Game of Golf". via NY Times. 1998
3. "Timeline of African-American achievements in golf". PGA. February 4, 2011