N.J.’s refusal to list the Camden home where MLK plotted his first protest on the state’s Register of Historic Places insults the civil rights leader’s legacy. By Linn Washington Jr., — A significant “first” usually merits the designation of historic. For example, the first formal protest against racial discrimination by civil rights icon Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in June 1950 — an action that produced King’s first lawsuit…
Black History Month lessons have been ‘stagnant’ for years, educators say. Here’s how some teachers are trying to change things. By Olivia B. Waxman, TIME — Freshman year can make…
Activists and preservationists are changing the kinds of places that are protected—and what it means to preserve them. By Casey Cep, The New Yorker — No one knows what happened to Gabriel’s body. Born into slavery the year his country declared its freedom, he trained as a plantation blacksmith and was hired out to foundries in Richmond, Virginia, where he befriended other enslaved people. Together, they absorbed, from the revolutionary…
By Rick Hellman, The University of Kansas — Playwright Darren Canady shocks audiences by opening his new two-act drama, “Reparations,” with a scene of a lynching. But he leavens that tragedy with later scenes of the love and dedication that sustained African Americans through centuries of trial, even offering an Afro-Futuristic vision of hope. Seattle’s Sound Theatre Company opened “Reparations” Jan. 8 at the city’s Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute. It…
Source CNN — The first monument in the United States honoring the victims of lynching has become a must-see civil rights attraction in Montgomery, Alabama, and now it’s been expanded. The Equal Justice Initiative opened its new Legacy Pavilion on Saturday — just in time to welcome visitors to the Alabama state capitol for the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday weekend. The Legacy Pavilion features a new memorial recognizing more than…
From mass incarceration to mass deportation, our nation remains in deep denial. By Michelle Alexander, NYT — Ten years have passed since my book, “The New Jim Crow,” was published. I wrote it to challenge our nation to reckon with the recurring cycles of racial reform, retrenchment and rebirth of caste-like systems that have defined our racial history since slavery. It has been an astonishing decade. Everything and nothing has…
By Associated Press — RICHMOND (AP) — After months of research, a university in Virginia’s capital city has confirmed that part of its campus was probably built over the graves…
Building a digital archive for decaying paper documents, preserving centuries of records about enslaved people. By Daniel Genkins — Paper documents are still priceless records of the past, even in a…
Antonia Eliason continues to make waves in her bid for the First Congressional District seat in Mississippi. By Frank Corder — The self-described Democratic Socialist candidate has already voiced support for Medicaid expansion, the Green New Deal, marijuana legalization, and the “Squad.” Now Eliason is pushing for reparations. In a tweet on Tuesday, Eliason wrote, “Reparations for slavery are long overdue. One of the gravest betrayals in American history is the unfulfilled…
By Alan Singer, HNN — Author’s note: On January 9, 2020 I delivered the Martin Luther King, Jr. tribute lecture at the Uniondale Public Library in Uniondale, New York. The presentation…
A black mess attendant was a Pearl Harbor hero. Now an aircraft carrier will have his name. By Kim Bellware, The Washington Post — It was just before 8 a.m. aboard the USS West Virginia, anchored in Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, when the first torpedo hit. Mess Attendant 2nd Class Doris Miller was deep into the day’s laundry when the blast sent one of his lieutenants racing to…
Liverpool could introduce plaques to give an “honest account” of places connected to the slave trade. By BBC News — Much of the city’s 18th Century wealth came from the trade involving British slavers transporting Africans across the Atlantic. Mayor Joe Anderson said paintings, street names and buildings in the city were “important parts of the historical record which should not be concealed”. He is calling for new signs to…