Uncovering Our History Through The Relics Left Behind
Posted in Art, and Black history
I wasn’t focused on stained-glass windows when I walked into the auction house some years ago for a sale of works by African American artist Frank J. Dillon. I wanted a sketchbook that an auctioneer…
Posted in Art, Black history, Books, and Ephemera/Paper/Documents
William Henry Dorsey was not only an artist but a collector. That’s not unusual. What is unusual is that he was both at a time when Black folks were struggling to survive the dehumanization of…
Posted in Art, Black history, collectibles, and history
Every now and then at auction, I’d pick up a box of sundry items and find a few coins in the mix. I know nothing about the value of old coins, but I always hoped…
Posted in Black history, history, and Medicine
First, I saw a dark wooden sign with large white letters that told me I was at the right place: The historic site of Dr. James Still, known as the “Black Doctor of the Pines.”…
Posted in Black history, history, and Signs
My next-door neighbor was the first on my street with a “Black Lives Matter” sign erected in her front yard. She pushed it into the black-mulched ground among her hosta plants not long after the…
Posted in Art, Black history, and Books
I knew exactly what I was looking for as I flipped through the carts of children’s books lined up in a hallway outside the abandoned school library. I wondered if there were any books with…
Posted in African American women, Art, and Black history
As a child, Gertrude Ann Graves had difficulty expressing herself. She stuttered. She wasn’t as lovely as her sister, whom relatives gushed over. She was a quiet girl who retreated to an apple tree on…
Posted in Black history, civil rights movement, and history
The gray metal machine looked innocent enough, but I knew that it was a remnant from an unhinged Jim Crow past. It didn’t have the power to stop anyone from voting, but the people who…
Posted in African American women, Black history, Ephemera/Paper/Documents, slavery, and Women
An African American baker named Cyrus Bustill baked bread for George Washington’s troops during the Revolutionary War. That’s what the documents showed, but family historian Joyce Mosley wanted more verification. So she decided to join…
Posted in Black history, and civil rights movement
As the Democratic Party holds its convention this week, I’m reminded of a relief kit that I came across at auction a few years ago. There was a box of them, unopened, each bearing the…
