Black History Month can be traced all the way back to September of 1915. In that year, historian Carter G. Woodson and minister Jesse E. Moorland founded the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History – also known as the ASNLH. This organization was dedicated to researching and promoting the achievements of not only black Americans but all prominent people of African descent. This group would go on to sponsor a National Negro History Week in 1926. The month of February was chosen because the birthdays of both Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass are in that month.