Although May 30, 1868 is cited as the first national commemoration of Memorial Day at Arlington National Cemetery, events lead by African Americans in Charleston, SC to decorate the graves of fallen Civil War soldiers occurred on May 1, 1865, less than a month after the Confederacy surrendered.
Reports of this early version of Memorial Day or “Decoration Day” as it was called, were rediscovered in the Harvard University archives in the late 1990s by historian David Blight, author of the 2018 biography Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom.
When Charleston fell and Confederate troops evacuated the badly damaged city, those freed from enslavement remained. One of the first things those emancipated men and women did was to give the fallen Union prisoners a proper burial. They exhumed the mass grave and reinterred the bodies in a new cemetery with a tall whitewashed fence inscribed with the words: “Martyrs of the Race Course.”
And then on May 1, 1865, something even more extraordinary happened. According to two reports that Blight found in The New York Tribune and The Charleston Courier, a crowd of 10,000 people, mostly freed slaves with some white missionaries, staged a parade around the race track. Three thousand Black schoolchildren carried bouquets of flowers and sang “John Brown’s Body.” Members of the famed 54th Massachusetts and other Black Union regiments were in attendance and performed double-time marches. Black ministers recited verses from the Bible.
Despite the size of the gathering and newspaper coverage, the memory of this event was “suppressed by white Charlestonians in favor of their own version of the day,” Blight stated in the New York Times in 2011.
On May 31, 2010, near a reflecting pool at Hampton Park, the city of Charleston reclaimed this history by installing a plaque commemorating the site as the place where Blacks held the first Memorial Day on May 1, 1865.
During the dedication of the plaque, the city’s mayor at the time, Joe Riley, was present to celebrate the historic occasion which included a brass band and a reenactment of the Massachusetts 54th Regiment.
In 2017, the City of Charleston erected yet another sign reclaiming the history and commemorating the event:
According to the Washington Post, state and federal officials announced that archaeologist Julie Schablitsky and her team believe they have found the site where Harriet Tubman lived with her parents and siblings in the early 1800s in Dorchester County, Maryland before she escaped enslavement and became a conductor for the Underground Railroad.
The structure, of unknown form, was owned by [Tubman’s] father. A timber foreman and lumberjack who had been enslaved, he had been given his freedom, the house where he lived and a piece of land near the Blackwater River by his enslaver.
Officials said bricks, datable pieces of 19th-century pottery, a button, a drawer pull, a pipe stem, old records and the location all pointed to the spot being the likely site of the Ben Ross cabin.
The find is a crucial piece of Tubman’s story, experts said. And it illuminates the role that her father, and her family, played in her development into the fearless Underground Railroad conductor that she became.
The Underground Railroad was the clandestine network of guides, like Tubman, and safe houses mostly across the eastern United States that rescued thousands of enslaved people from bondage in the South in the years before the Civil War.
Between about 1850 and 1860, using stealth and disguise, Tubman made 13 trips home, spiriting 70 people out of enslavement, historians believe. Among those she saved were several brothers and her parents, who, while no longer enslaved, were still in danger in Maryland.
Her father was a devout patriarch who taught Tubman the ways of the marshy woodlands where they lived and struggled to keep his family together within the machinery of slavery, experts said.
Once free, Ben purchased his enslaved wife, Rit, and for a time sheltered Tubman and several of her siblings, all still enslaved, in his cabin in what is now the federal Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge, south of Cambridge, Md.
Kate Clifford Larson, author of the Harriet Tubman biography Bound For The Promised Land, is quoted as saying: “That landscape became her classroom. Those years she lived with her father were absolutely crucial to the development of Harriet Tubman.”
The project began last year when the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service bought for $6 million a 2,600-acre tract adjacent to Blackwater and refuge manager Marcia Pradines heard the Ben Ross cabin might have existed in the tract. She contacted Maryland experts to see if an archaeologist wanted to investigate.
Schablitsky and her team went have been working in the area since last fall and dug over 1,000 test pits. Only recently, after scouring the area with a metal detector, did something finally turn up — a coin from 1808 — that finally lead them on the right path to the right place.
Archaeology consultants Brandon Ellis and Aaron Levinthal discuss the Ross site April 2. Harriet Tubman is believed to have lived at the site with her family in her late teens and early 20s. (Julie Schablitsky)
The coin was found about a quarter-mile from where the cabin would eventually be located, and last month as the team dug further, more artifacts were uncovered from the 1820s-1840s time period.
The combination of records, location and artifacts finally added up, Schablitsky said. “It’s not just one artifact that tells us we have something. It’s the assemblage. It’s the multiple pieces.”
On Friday, State Senator Steven Bradford (D-CA, Gardena) reintroduced a bill to the California State Legislature that would pave the way for the City of Manhattan Beach to return ownership of coveted oceanside property to the descendants of its former owners, Willa and Charles Bruce.
According to the Los Angeles Times, the Bruces originally purchased the land in 1912 and ran a cafe, dance hall and lodge on the oceanfront lots to provide resort space and activities to African Americans, and the area started being called “Bruce’s Beach.”
But white neighbors resented the resort’s popularity. Tires were slashed. The Ku Klux Klan purportedly set fire to a mattress under the main deck and torched a Black-owned home nearby.
When harassment failed to drive the Bruce’s Beach community out of town, city officials in 1924 condemned the neighborhood and seized more than two dozen properties through eminent domain. The reason, they said, was an urgent need for a public park.
The Bruces sought $70,000 for their two beachfront properties and $50,000 in damages. They received $14,500.
For decades, the properties sat empty. The Bruce parcels were transferred to the state in 1948, then to the county in 1995. A county lifeguard center occupies the land today. As for the remaining lots, city officials eventually turned them into a park, worried that family members might sue to regain their land unless it was used for the purpose for which it had been originally taken.
Though a plaque designating the and renaming the park area as “Bruce’s Beach” was erected in 2007, this symbolic acknowledgment ]did not address the underlying issues of injustice and racism at the core of why “eminent domain” was invoked by the local government to strip the Bruce’s of their property.
In recent years there has been a grassroots effort to bring the full history of Bruce’s Beach to light as well as a push towards reparations for the Bruce family.
Despite comprehensive efforts over the years to record Los Angeles’ historic places, the city’s historic designation programs, by their own estimation, do not yet reflect the depth and breadth of African American history. Just over three percent of the city’s 1,200 designated local landmarks are linked to African American heritage.
Over the next three years, the project will work with local communities and cultural institutions to more fully recognize and understand African American experiences in Los Angeles. The work aims to identify and help preserve the places that best represent these stories and work with communities to develop creative approaches that meet their own aims for placemaking, identity, and empowerment.
As the African American population of such areas as West Adams and Jefferson Park began growing in the 1940s, new Black churches were founded. One of the most influential was Holman United Methodist, which commissioned architect Kenneth Nels Lind to design this sanctuary in 1958.
The project is led by the Getty Conservation Institute and the Office of Historic Resources (OHR) within Los Angeles’ Department of City Planning, which is responsible for the management of historic resources within the city. A community engagement program will create a space for meaningful input and local partnerships, drawing upon community-based knowledge of lesser-known histories.
“Historic preservation is about the acknowledgment and elevation of places and stories. The point of this work is to make sure that the stories and places of African Americans in Los Angeles are more present and complete than previously,” says Tim Whalen, John E. and Louise Bryson Director at the Getty Conservation Institute. “The work is also about making sure that preservation methods are examined for systemic bias. It’s ultimately about equity.”
Before embarking on this project, Getty and the city convened a virtual roundtable composed of a group of national and local thought leaders with experience in urban planning, historic preservation, African American history, and/or grassroots and community organizing.
Their discussions of diversity and inclusion in preservation policy helped shape the initiative and its goals. In particular, their input shed light on existing processes and practices that perpetuate biases in how places are recognized and protected, and helped expose current preservation policies that prevent the conservation of places of importance to Black communities.
“This project will illuminate overlooked narratives and historic places important to Los Angeles and our nation that deserve protection and recognition,” says Brent Leggs, executive director of the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund at the National Trust for Historic Preservation and a member of the project’s initial thought leader round table meeting.
“Through public and private partnership, the Getty and City of Los Angeles can model broader reform in the U.S. preservation field and can work proactively at the local government and city levels to grow pathways for equitable interpretation and community-driven preservation.”
This project will include research to rethink and potentially expand the heritage preservation toolkit. This involves examining how current historic preservation and planning processes and policies may be reinforcing systemic racism. It will also work to bring new and improved processes that address injustices and bring greater inclusion and diversity to historic preservation practices.
Barber shops, such as Magnificent Brothers—in operation in the Crenshaw district since 1970— could be found eligible for listing based on their social significance to the community.
The initial phase of this project will also provide a framework for identifying and evaluating properties relating to African American history in Los Angeles. In 2018 OHR completed a framework for identifying African American heritage in the city, drawing upon nine themes that included civil rights, deed restriction and segregation, religion and spirituality, social clubs and organizations, and visual arts. The project will include deeper citywide community engagement around this framework and allow for the report’s potential expansion.
“As the largest planning department in the United States, City Planning is uniquely positioned to chart a course for a more fair, equitable, and just Los Angeles for future generations, in part, through cultural heritage and education,” says Vince Bertoni, director of planning for the City of Los Angeles. “We are excited to highlight this broader range of values and history that better represents our diverse city.”
In addition to rethinking the preservation toolkit, the project will include official historic designation of a number of African American historic places by the city. The work of the project will also extend beyond traditional preservation tools to address the development of broader cultural preservation strategies with selected historically Black communities.
The project will also provide opportunities for emerging history, preservation and planning professionals through dedicated paid internships. Additionally, Getty and OHR will soon launch a search for a consultant project leader to further develop, manage, and implement the work of this project, under the guidance of a soon-to-be-established local advisory committee representing key stakeholders in the city’s African American communities.
“The history of Los Angeles is incomplete without recognition of the African American individuals and institutions that shaped the economic, cultural and civic narrative of the region,” says Susan D. Anderson, history curator and program manager at the California African American Museum in Los Angeles and a member of the project’s initial thought leader round table meeting. “This important project will expand how heritage is defined and will provide an opportunity to work with local communities and residents to unearth stories that are vital to our understanding of the place we call home.”
The City of Los Angeles and the Getty Conservation Institute have worked together for nearly two decades on local heritage projects. Their joint efforts include SurveyLA, a citywide survey of historic places that was conducted from 2010 through 2017. SurveyLA covered the entire City of Los Angeles—over 880,000 legal parcels in an area of almost 500 square miles—and identified resources dating from approximately 1865 to 1980. The data from SurveyLA was used to create HistoricPlacesLA, a website launched in 2015 that allows the public to explore these places.
Golden State Mutual Life Insurance building designed by Paul Williams
The announcement follows the Getty Research Institute and the USC School of Architecture’s recent joint acquisition of the archives of Paul R. Williams, one of the most significant African American architects of the 20th century. Several Williams buildings are already designated historic landmarks in Los Angeles, including the 28th Street YMCA and Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Company.
The new initiative also builds upon the work of City Planning, in establishing the Office of Racial Justice, Equity, and Transformative Planning in 2020 in response to Mayor Eric Garcetti’s Executive Order No. 27 on Racial Equity in City Government. Through the office, City Planning is comprehensively confronting how land use policies and zoning practices have reinforced racial segregation, environmental injustice, and poor health outcomes.
Most museums with a national profile are created and built by cities, states or institutions that work with curators and major funding.
There are also, however, a select few museums of renown that are built up from a grassroots level by community members determined to inform and educate future generations about history and culture from an authentic and engaging perspective.
Sociologist Dr. Elmer Martin and his wife, Dr. Joanna Martin, were most definitely among those select few.
Drs. Joanna and Elmer Martin, co-founders of The National Great Blacks in Wax Museum (photo: wernercoach.com)
The Martins wanted to teach Black history in a way that would grab the attention of school children —so they did it with wax.
The Martins had wax heads made in the likenesses of Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Mary McLeod Bethune and Nat Turner, then used department store mannequins for the bodies.
They originally presented the figures at schools and community centers in Baltimore, Maryland, but after garnering donations and grants, the figures were permanently installed at the Great Blacks in Wax Museum in 1983.
Just over two decades later, in 2004, the Great Blacks in Wax Museum was recognized by the United States Congress and was designated The National Great Blacks in Wax Museum.
[Photo: Workers removing a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee from the National Statuary Hall Collection in Washington. | Jack Mayer/Office of Governor of Virginia]
According to huffpost.com, the statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee was removed from the U.S. Capitol early Monday morning.
The statue has been one of two representing Virginia (every state gets two; Virginia’s second is of George Washington) in the Capitol’s National Statuary Hall since 1909.
There is already a movement to replace Lee’s statue with one of Black civil rights activist Barbara Johns, who led an all-Black student walkout to protest school segregation in 1951.
In July, the Commission for Historical Statues in the United States Capitol ― an eight-member commission tasked with deciding whether to recommend the removal of Lee’s statue from the Capitol ― unanimously voted to have the monument removed.
Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam (D), who had testified before the commission in favor of the removal, called the moment an “important step forward for our Commonwealth and our country” in a statement on Monday.
“The Confederacy is a symbol of Virginia’s racist and divisive history, and it is past time we tell our story with images of perseverance, diversity, and inclusion,” he said.
Earlier in December, the eight-member commission voted to replace Lee’s statue with one of Johns, whose organizing and ultimate court case later became one of the five cases reviewed in the landmark 1954 Supreme Court Brown v. Board of Education decision.
The statue of Johns must be approved by the state’s General Assembly, according to Gov. Northam’s office.
Yesterday, city workers in Charlottesville, VA brought down a Confederate statue near the site of a violent white nationalist rally three years ago, where dozens were injured and one woman, Heather Heyer, was killed when a self-avowed white supremacist drove his car into a crowd of people protesting the rally.
The removal of the bronze figure of a Confederate soldier known as “At Ready,” is what is being seen in Charlottesville as a milestone in eliminating oppressive symbols of the Civil War from public properties shared by all taxpayers.
According to the Washington Post, Albemarle County supervisors voted earlier this summer to take down “At Ready,” even though the statue was not the focal point of the 2017 rally, but a block away from the statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee that white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups said they were defending in the clash.
Rochester, New York‘s airport will be renamed to honor 19th-century abolitionist and freedom fighter Frederick Douglass, one of its most famous and influential residents.
According to usatoday.com, the Monroe County Legislature voted Tuesday night to change the airport’s name to the “Frederick Douglass – Greater Rochester International Airport,” adding the Douglass’ name to the existing airport’s title.
Dr. Billy C. Hawkins (photo courtesy Talledega College)
Talladega College will hold a naming ceremony for the Dr. Billy C. Hawkins Student Activity Center on August 14, 2020. The newly constructed 47,000-square-foot student center/arena will be the first-ever campus facility to be named in honor of one of the institution’s African American presidents.
In 2008, when Dr. Billy C. Hawkins became the 20th president of Talladega College, the HBCU was struggling to survive. Dr. Hawkins implemented rigorous plans for renovation and growth that transformed the college.
As a result of his vision, enrollment doubled from just over 300 students to 601 students in one semester; athletic programs were reinstated for the first time in ten years; and major campus beautification projects were undertaken.
The College enjoyed record-high enrollment in both the 2018-2019 academic year and the 2019-2020 academic year. Talladega College now has over 1200 students.
Under the leadership of Dr. Hawkins, Talladega College is listed among Princeton Review’s best colleges in the Southeast, U.S. News and World Report’s most innovative colleges, and Kiplinger’s Best Value Colleges. Talladega recently launched its first-ever graduate program, an online Master of Science in Computer Information Systems. In addition, the campus is undergoing a major physical transformation.
New construction on campus includes a 45,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art residence hall, which opened in 2019, and the Dr. William R. Harvey Museum of Art, which opened in 2020. The Dr. William R. Harvey Museum of Art houses six critically-acclaimed Hale Woodruff murals, including the renowned Amistad Murals.
After two public hearings, the Boston Art Commission voted to remove the Emancipation Group, a statue installed in 1879 in Boston’s Park Square, according to a statement announcing the removal.
The statue is a replica of one in Washington DC, and has been controversial since its installation for the depiction of the freed slave.
The statue features Archer Alexander, a Black man who “assisted the Union Army, escaped slavery, and was recaptured under the Fugitive Slave Act,” the statement says.
The vote follows a nationwide movement calling for the removal of monuments that celebrate the Confederacy or viewed as racist.
“For generations, Bostonians have called for its removal due to its racist depiction of a Black person. Many also feel it implies that one person ended slavery and misrepresents the complexity of United States history,” the statement said.
The statue has always been criticized, but a petition started in early June renewed interest in its removal.
Tory Bullock, a Boston area actor and activist, launched the petition with the intention of getting 1,000 signatures, but quickly surpassed that goal. Currently, the petition has over 12,000 signatures.
Bullock was inspired by the social and cultural moment that Black Lives Matter protests created and felt this was a good time to reintroduce the issue.
by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (
