Uncovering the Past: the Story Behind a Slave’s Bill of Sale
Part of the Benjamin Drummond Emancipation Day Celebration.
Mapping Segregation Walking Tour
Historian Sarah Shoenfeld, co-director of the online public history project Mapping Segregation in Washington DC, will lead a walking tour of DC’s adjacent LeDroit Park and Bloomingdale neighborhoods. Established as an exclusive, gated suburb in 1871, African Americans began moving to LeDroit Park in the 1890s, during the same period Bloomingdale began to be developed as an exclusively white neighborhood.
Marion Barry Reconsidered: Hope and Anxiety
Historians Dr. Chris Myers Asch and Dr. G. Derek Musgrove moderate a conversation with Dr. Frank Smith, civil rights activist and a founding member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and Dr. Alphonse G. Hill, former Deputy Mayor for Finance during the Barry administration.
The 13th Amendment and the History of Policing Black America Since Slavery
The 13th Amendment declared that “neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted shall exist within the United States.” This session explores the nuances of the 13th Amendment by considering its relationship to mass incarceration among black men. Is it slavery by another name?
Documentary Screening: American Lows
Darnley Hodge, film producer
2017 Emancipation Day Concert
The Emancipation Day Concert will be held on Freedom Plaza.
Emancipation Day Parade
The Emancipation Day Parade will be held from 1 pm to 3 pm.
Scheduled Street Closures: 2016 Emancipation Day Parade
Date Released:
Some closures begin at 7:30 am Saturday, April 16.
Lecture: Before Emancipation: Slavery and Freedom in the District of Columbia, 1790 - 1862
Author, scholar, lecturer and historian of the African Diaspora C.R. Gibbs will present a lecture entitled “Before Emancipation: Slavery and Freedom in the District of Columbia, 1790 - 1862."
DC Emancipation Day - Documentary Screening and Panel Discussion
Celebrate DC Emancipation Day with a documentary screening and panel discussion with DC statehood rights activist and documentarian Anise Jenkins. This film and discussion will explore the history and struggle of freedom, civil rights and autonomy in the District of Columbia.