Here’s a brief look back in time on this day, February 26th.
In 1919, a canyon that stretches across 280 miles in the middle of Arizona is made a national park. This marvel, known as the Grand Canyon, was a product over two billion years in the making. 26th U.S. president Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt – a well-known conservationist – helped preserve its natural beauty by marking 800,000 acres of the Canyon as a national monument. It took a decade for it to receive national park status under the Wilson administration due to the Canyon’s valuable natural resources. Miners, loggers, and commercial property companies alike each sought to exploit it for financial gain. Today, an estimated 5 million visitors trek to the Canyon annually to experience what Teddy saw: an unspeakable beauty.
In 1938, 108 workers of a factory operated by the National Dollar Store begins striking for better work conditions in San Francisco. The movement’s leader, Sue Ko Lee, helped organize the Chinese Ladies’ Garment Workers Union, Local 341. It was one of the first labor unions organized in benefit of Chinese-American workers; they were typically subjugated to long hours, harsh conditions, and little pay in factories like this one. The strikes were successful, earning the workers a 5% raise and improved health and safety standards. However, the factory closed the following year after various failed business ventures. It still marked as a pivotal moment for workers’ rights in the United States because of the widespread prejudice for Chinese laborers at the time.
In 2012, an African American teen in Sanford, FL, is shot to death by neighborhood watch person George Zimmerman. The victim, Trayvon Martin, was walking home after a trip to a local 7-Eleven when Zimmerman reported Martin to police – citing his behavior as “suspicious”. How the altercation started remains disputed. Zimmerman was charged with second-degree murder and manslaughter a year later after claiming self-defense. Zimmerman was acquitted from the charges following a jury trial. This served as a catalyst of the Black Lives Matter movement, which focuses on combating racial discrimination and highlighting social reform for African Americans.