by | Sep 26, 2020 9:27 pm | Comments (1)
Ram Vishwanathan Photo
Smiles of pride discernible through their masks, Julian Lewis and Shawn Williams handed over forms Saturday to register to vote for the first time.
Continue reading ‘Mindful Of Civil Rights History, Kiyama, Fraternities unite To Register Voters’
by | Sep 16, 2020 3:04 pm | Comments (2)
Thomas Breen / NHFPL images
Clockwise from top left: City arts director Adriane Jefferson, Stetson Librarian Diane Brown, and the public library notice for Dana King’s and Lisa Dent’s talk about William Lanson.
When young Black New Haveners walk by the new statue of William “King” Lanson, Dana King hopes they think to themselves, “That looks like me.”
Continue reading ‘“Gov” Sculptor Urges Kids To Claim History’
by | Sep 10, 2020 4:00 pm | Comments (0)
“When you pray, move your feet.”
The late civil rights leader John Lewis would invoke that African proverb in reference to the marches that changed American history.
by | Sep 10, 2020 10:11 am | Comments (1)
Activist Angela Davis told activist Ericka Huggins that she remembered when they met, in Los Angeles in the 1960s. She met Huggins’s husband John when Davis joined the Black Panthers. She remembered when John was murdered. She had made sure that Huggins’s young daughter was in good hands when Huggins was arrested, and she was there when Huggins was released.
The connection between the two women was deep and strong. Both had been Black Panthers. Both had spent time in jail. And both had spent the past decades continuing to work for social justice.
On Wednesday night, in a Zoom talk hosted by Artspace — and filled to capacity — as part of its programming for “Revolution on Trial,” Davis and Huggins connected again, to talk about education.
Continue reading ‘Artspace Talk Brings The Revolution To The Classroom’
by | Aug 20, 2020 7:58 am | Comments (2)
Scenes from These Truths.
There is a “gravitational pull” dragging down Black men in America. “There’s no respect in our community for each other as brothers.” “There are not enough men who are positive role models.” “What can we do as a society to lift Black men up, because y’all did a hell of a job tearing them down?”
These and many other hard truths came to light Wednesday night in the screening of and panel discussion about the short film These Truths: A Documentary on the State of the Black Community, hosted online by The Narrative Project and drawing an audience of about 100.
by | Aug 5, 2020 11:02 am | Comments (0)
Kwadwo Adae
Kerry, Addys, Norm, Sarah, Vanessa, Ericka.
We know the subjects of the paintings are protestors because of the crowds assembled behind them, silhouettes gathered with raised arms and picket signs. One carries a bullhorn. Another has the Puerto Rican flag emblazoned on a tank top. Another throws a fist in the air to reveal a tattoo on the wrist.
As the accompanying notes say, “New Haven painter and activist Kwadwo Adae celebrates his compatriots and heroes” in these series of portraits.
The subjects are Kerry Ellington, Addys Castillo, Norm Clement, Ericka Huggins, Sarah Pimenta, and Vanessa Suárez. Adae has depicted them in their “protest armor.”
In putting them side by side by side, Adae deftly connects past to present. He shows that the protests of 1970 over the Black Panther trials in New Haven have cast a long shadow, and suggests further that they are part of a continuum, an even longer thread stretching back perhaps to the beginnings of the country.
by | Jul 21, 2020 9:57 am | Comments (1)
Contributed photos
John Lewis getting arrested in D.C. in 2013 immigrant-rights action.
The late Congressman John Lewis was not only a giant of the civil rights arena.
His advocacy also touched us directly in New Haven during the ongoing movement for immigrant rights.
by | Jul 21, 2020 9:23 am | Comments (0)
Early in aninterview with Chad Browne-Springer of the New Haven-based band Phat A$tronaut, Eric Rey had a realization. He and Browne-Springer had shared a stage before, perhaps a few times. He had seen Browne-Springer perform at least a dozen times. But, Rey said, “you and I have never had a conversation.”
Continue reading ‘How Music Saved Chad Browne-Springer’s Life’
by | Jul 20, 2020 5:41 pm | Comments (3)
Courtesy of Sean Hardy
New Haven descendants keep connection strong for 35th reunion anniversary despite Covid interruption.
by | Jul 10, 2020 2:42 pm | Comments (4)
Dana King photo
The head and, behind, the body of the new William Lanson statue coming to the Farmington Canal.
Sculptor King working in her Oakland studio.
A seven-foot-tall bronze statue of William “King” Lanson will soon stand along the Farmington Canal — giving a permanent, public, and highly visible form to a Black New Havener who helped build the modern city.
by | Jul 10, 2020 11:20 am | Comments (2)
Courtney Luciana photo
The Freedom Amistad Schooner raised the Black Lives Matter flag — and in the process drew a link between the Amistad revolt in 1839 and freedom struggles of the modern day.
by | Jul 6, 2020 9:39 pm | Comments (6)
Thomas Breen photo
Protesters at a Black Lives Matter march in June.
Racism is now an officially recognized public health crisis in the City of New Haven.
Continue reading ‘Alders Declare Racism A Public Health Crisis’
by | Jul 4, 2020 7:19 pm | Comments (34)
Thomas Breen photos
Marching on Saturday. Below: An American flag with the faces of Black men and women killed by the police.
Over 100 young people from throughout the county marched and rallied downtown to “cancel” Independence Day as it currently exists.
They argued that true freedom for all Americans won’t come through fireworks or backyard barbecues — but rather through protest, political advocacy, and an honest reckoning with this country’s history of oppression.
by | Jul 3, 2020 3:46 pm | Comments (11)
Ted Littleford
Babz Rawls-Ivy, Erik Clemons, David Blight, and Walter O. Evans kept a Fourth of July tradition going — by reading Frederick Douglass’s 1852 Oration, “What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July.”
Continue reading ‘“What, To The American Slave, Is Your Fourth Of July?”’
by | Jul 1, 2020 10:48 am | Comments (1)
Leigh Busby Photos
During the removal of the statue of Christopher Columbus in Wooster Square on June 24, there was a moment that crystallized what it was all about. As city workers secured the ropes around the statue to lift it off its pedestal, it occurred to a few in the crowd that it looked a lot like a lynching, and in that visual echo, they found some restitution.
Continue reading ‘Photographer Chronicles The City’s Upheaval’
by | Jun 29, 2020 10:51 am | Comments (1)
Cara McDonough Photo
Robbins in her Erector Square space in February.
Tap dancer and instructor Alexis Robbins has had plenty to keep her busy during the Covid-19 pandemic — especially as the history of her chosen art form is inextracably entangled with the story of race relations and racism in the United States.
by | Jun 26, 2020 12:22 pm | Comments (15)
Brian Slattery Photo
On Friday morning a display appeared in front of the pedestal that until two days earlier held up the statue of Christopher Columbus in Wooster Square
It was put there shortly after 10 a.m. by Malcolm Welfare, Ricquel Pratt, and Steve Nardini of the Lineage Group. Within minutes of the display appearing, passersby stopped to check it out. There, they learned about William Lanson, a Black engineer and entrepreneur who, in the 19th century, escaped from slavery to become a pioneer in the city’s development.
by | Jun 22, 2020 9:41 am | Comments (2)
Kai Perry, Meredith Benson, and Babz Rawls Ivy.
Juneteenth on Ivy Street spanned centuries.
Continue reading ‘Backyard Bash Brings Black Triumphs Alive’
by | Jun 22, 2020 9:21 am | Comments (5)
Drummer Brian Jarawa Gray peered into the camera from a room being Zoomed, a djembe stationed at his feet. “First of all, I want to salute the ancestors,” he said. “I’m glad we’re getting the opportunity to present ourselves. To be able to share what I have on another level.”
Continue reading ‘In Juneteenth Drum Class, The Music Is Practice For Life’
by | Jun 19, 2020 11:52 pm | Comments (2)
Sam Gurwitt photo
Jill Marks, with microphone.
Red, pink, white, and yellow flowers lay at the foot of the Amistad Memorial in front of City Hall Friday afternoon as Beaver Hills Alder Jill Marks broke into impromptu song.
by | Jun 19, 2020 10:53 pm | Comments (2)
Lucy Gellman photos
Marching up Orange Street to East Rock park.
One of the youth leaders of Friday’s liberation march.
Over 500 people filled the streets of downtown and East Rock to celebrate the 155th anniversary of the end of slavery — and to lift up the movement for black liberation that continues to this day.
by | Jun 19, 2020 3:14 pm | Comments (3)
As at least four demonstrations were planned around town in conjunction with Juneteenth, Mayor Justin Elicker and Board of Alders Tyisha Walker-Myers announced that it will become an official city holiday.
Continue reading ‘Juneteenth Declared An Official City Holiday’
by | Jun 19, 2020 10:46 am | Comments (24)
Thomas Breen photo
The current Christopher Columbus statue in Wooster Square.
(Opinion) The Christopher Columbus statue in Wooster Square Park is being removed.
In its stead, we should honor a Black entrepreneur who played a pivotal role in building a neighborhood that is now super-majority white. That man’s name was William Lanson.
Continue reading ‘Opinion: Replace Columbus With King Lanson’
by | Jun 5, 2020 1:38 pm | Comments (8)
Karen DuBois-Walton and John Lewis on “Dateline.”
The painful revelations of police violence against African-Americans have also unleashed hope, in the view of two New Haven community leaders.
by | May 15, 2020 1:25 pm | Comments (5)
John Hill T. Photo
May Day 1970 rally on the Green.
A half century after a Black Panther trial consumed New Haven and thrust it into the national discussion over racial and social justice, survivors of the episode as well as a new generation revisited that time to see what it means today.
Continue reading ‘50 Years Later, Panther Moment, Legacy Revisited’