Black History Month Showcase 2026

Join us each week of Black History Month as we highlight notable contributions made by African Americans—honoring the innovators, leaders, artists, and changemakers whose work has shaped our nation’s history and continues to influence our future.  

Jerry Lawson: Gaming Trailblazer 

This week's Black History Month Showcase features engineer Gerald “Jerry” Lawson, often called the Father of Modern Gaming.
Lawson (1940–2011) revolutionized the video game industry by inventing the first home console with interchangeable game cartridges—the Fairchild Channel F—helping lay the foundation for today’s multi-billion-dollar gaming industry.
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Gladys West: GPS pioneer

NCBC kicked off Black History Month with a tribute to mathematician and GPS pioneer Gladys West, who died January 17, 2026, at age 95.
A Black woman who came of age during the Jim Crow era of segregation, West went on to help shape the future of navigation by developing groundbreaking mathematical models of the Earth—work that became foundational to modern global positioning systems (GPS). 
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