Thursday | July 13 | DAY 4
Happy #DouglassWeek 2023
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Happy #DouglassWeek 2023 〰️
DAY 4 was very exciting and we loved every minute of it!
On Thursday, July 13, we started with some live TV interviews and are just in awe about how warm and welcoming everyone has been in Rochester!
Meanwhile, in Cork, our second Cork Abolitionists Trail Tour took place and people loved it! No matter the weather, everyone showed up and enjoyed the fantastic tour hosted by our #DouglassWeek colleague Dr Adrian Mulligan.
Online, our audiences were captivated by the talk that Prof. Mary Burke, University of Connecticut, gave about Frederick Douglass and Frank Yerby!
Like during the last two days, we joined our friends at the Rochester Museum & Science Center for a special reading of Frederick’s Journey by Doreen Rappaport. The book, winner of numerous awards from Kirkus, the Junior Library Guild, and the New York Public Library, points the way for everyone — men, women, and children — to bear out the true meaning of freedom and democracy.
A little later, we went back to the Rochester Museum & Science Center for a guided tour of the Flight to Freedom exhibition. We explored the paths that courageous freedom seekers followed through Rochester in this dramatic, interactive exhibition. We walked in the footsteps of Frederick Douglass, Austin Steward, Harriet Jacobs, and Reverend Thomas James as they overcome huge obstacles to build free lives. And we learned how they joined Rochester activists in the fight to abolish slavery and help others seeking freedom.
Unfortunately, due to unforeseen circumstances, we had to postpone our “Curating Activism” panel but we are so excited about it and are already working on finding a new date/time. Stay tuned and we will let you know when things will happen!
Last but certainly not least, we went to Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives in Rochester and saw an incredible panel called “Ink on the page: Making our mark in predominately white spaces”. In the spirit of Frederick Douglass, Micah Williams, Domenique Williams, Yash Chitrakar and Nashae Prout, four Ph.D. students at the University of Rochester, discussed and expanded upon the ways students of color survive/thrive/provide/reside/deny the spaces that historically have intended to erase their narratives from the world.
We are very excited for the next two days of #DouglassWeek2023 and hope you are, too. Stay tuned and follow us on social media for more information!
Watch and rewatch everything that happened on DAY 4 on our YouTube channel! Enjoy!
LINKS TO ALL EVENTS (DAY 4):
Ink on Paper (link to be added on Friday)
Want to know what’s happening tomorrow?
On day 5, we will start with a conversation between Douglass descendants Nettie Washington Douglass and Kenneth B. Morris, Jr., with Kathy Carr, a descendant of Elizabeth and Neal Hardy, who saved Frederick Douglass from a mob attack in Indianapolis in 1843. We will record this conversation and make it available to everyone
Afterwards, we will hear from 7-year-old Billy Chalton and be able to watch the excellent video he made about Frederick Douglass in his hometown, Newcastle Upon Tyne. We are very excited for this and are a big fan of Billy!
Next, Mark Doherty and Dr. Tom Thorpe, the founders of the Anti-Slavery Belfast tour, will take us on a virtual tour through the lesser known history of Belfast’s complicity in the transatlantic slave trade and the city’s valiant role as a hotspot of abolitionist activism from the late 18th century to the mid-Victorian era.
Later in the evening, in our next Douglass Dialogue event, Kenneth B. Morris, Jr., great-great-great grandson of Frederick and Anna Douglass and Professor Celeste-Marie Bernier (University of Edinburgh) will hold a conversation providing response and contemplation about facts and stories revealed through Bernier’s extensive research into the lives of the Douglass grandchildren. This is the third conversation in a series between Bernier and Morris about the Douglass women and the Douglass sons. The two prior conversations, which took place during #DW2022, are available on our YouTube channel.
In the last event of the day, Dr. Jesse Olsavsky (Duke Kunshan University) will hold a talk at FDFI headquaters in Rochester and explore how the ideas and deeds of Frederick Douglass were remembered and reinvoked in the Pan-African Movement. If you are in Rochester, join us!
If you can’t be there in person or a scheduled event does not suit your schedule, you may go to our YouTube channel and watch and rewatch all of our events!