February is Black History Month, and organizations across the region are holding exhibits, lectures, and other gatherings in commemoration of important people and events in African American history.
Here’s what’s happening.
Art & Exhibitions
Zimmerli Art Museum
“Allan Rohan Crite: Neighborhood” opens at the art museum affiliated with Rutgers University on Wednesday, February 11, and remains on view through July 31.
The artist born in New Jersey in 1910 used his art to depict African American urban life in the 20th century. The Zimmerli exhibit “offers a sweeping overview of Crite’s long career and enduring legacy as a storyteller, chronicler, and cultural historian, from his early paintings of everyday life to his mid-century experiments with printmaking and self-fashioning,” museum materials state.
“Crite gifted the art world with iconic imagery that spans much of the 20th century, but only recently has he gained recognition in a broader art-historical context,” said Maura Reilly, director of the Zimmerli. “The artist primarily depicted the people and places around his longtime home of Boston, but his work evokes a feeling of belonging that is universal.”
“Allan Rohan Crite: Neighborhood” features 65 paintings and works on paper, exploring themes meaningful to the artist: neighborhood, community and religion. Over a career that spans eight decades, Crite documented the multicultural, multiracial and multigenerational communities of Boston, as well as historic social and economic changes that transformed the nation in the latter half of the 20th century.
Crite’s vibrant paintings of neighborhood scenes from the 1930s and 1940s are some of his most celebrated works. While many of his contemporaries in New York portrayed Black subjects through two stereotypical extremes — famous entertainers or anonymous figures — Crite chose his middle-class neighbors in Boston. He captured their everyday activities: children learning and playing, mothers and babies meeting in the park, men reading the news on the corner, people commuting and at the office.
A celebration of Black history and the exhibit’s opening is part of the museum’s free monthly art party, Spark Night, featuring live music, art activities, and exhibition-themed mocktails on Thursday, February 12, from 5 to 8 p.m.
Also in conjunction with the exhibit, the Stoutsburg Sourland African American Museum’s Heritage Singers present a choral performance of spirituals rooted in African American musical traditions and reflecting themes of community, faith, and everyday life. The concert takes place Saturday, February 28, from 2 to 4 p.m., with a reception to follow.
The museum is located at 71 Hamilton Street, New Brunswick. Admission is free. Registration for the concert is encouraged. Visit zimmerli.rutgers.edu for more information.
Hollowbrook Community Center
Ewing Township marks Black History month with the exhibit “Oh Freedom!” on view Friday, February 20, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m.
The six-panel display was created by New Jersey State Parks, Forests & Historic Sites to introduce visitors to the Black soldiers of the American Revolution. These soldiers played important roles on both sides of the Revolution.
Hollowbrook Community Center is located at 320 Hollowbrook Drive, Ewing. Visit ewingnj.org for more information.
Morven Museum and Garden
Foundation Academies, a free public charter school in Trenton, has partnered with the Princeton Battlefield Society to present “Men W/O Shoes,” a first-of-its-kind exhibit highlighting the role of Black soldiers in the American Revolution.
An opening night reception takes place Thursday, February 19, from 5 to 7 p.m. at Morven Museum & Garden in Princeton. The exhibit will also be open to the public on Saturday, February 21, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Historians estimate Black soldiers comprised between 5 to 20 percent of the colonial army. “Men W/O Shoes” brings their stories to life, allowing visitors to experience the Battles of Trenton and Princeton through the lives of 14 Black soldiers who often marched barefoot and fought in place of their owners alongside General George Washington for the nation’s freedom — though not for their own.
The soldiers featured in the exhibit are Charles Ailstock, James Ailstock, Edward “Ned” Bradley, Phillip James, Robert Prince Green, Primus Hall, Job Lathrop, Edward Hopps, Isaac Walker, Peter Jennings, Cato Smith, Jacob Francis, Oliver Cromwell, and Samuel Sutphin
Through archival and historical research, 30 members of the Foundation Academies’ Black Student Union in grades 9-12, stepped into the role of historians, uncovering and retelling the lives of these overlooked patriots under the guidance of advisors Casey Scott and Earl Wallace.
“There would be no 250th anniversary if it weren’t for these 14 men,” said Scott, a student success team school social worker. “This project takes Black history and places it where it belongs, at the center of American history.”
The exhibit features student-created, AI-generated monologues, a behind-the-scenes documentary, and a companion art installation inspired by JET magazine covers by Philadelphia visual artist Shaheed Rucker. Together the multimedia elements bring these soldiers’ 18th century stories to life using 21st century methods designed to engage students, and spark reflection and dialogue.
Following the event, the project will be featured online and added to the Princeton Battlefield Society’s growing digital encyclopedia of American Revolution history in New Jersey. Educators will be able to use this resource to support lessons about these battles, the Revolutionary War and the nation’s founding. The research will also expand Princeton Battlefield Society’s Eyewitness to the Revolution program.
“While historians have long acknowledged Black participation in Washington’s army, there has never been a deep dive into who these men were as individuals,” said Mark Herr, Princeton Battlefield Society trustee. “They marched, fought, and bled, alongside other soldiers. We’re proud to partner with Foundation Academies to ensure brave men like Oliver Cromwell and Samuel Sutphin are not left out when we tell that story.”
Living History
William Trent House
The museum housed in the 1719 home of the founder of the settlement of Trenton hosts its annual “Four Centuries of African American Soldiers” event on Saturday, February 21, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
The free, family-friendly living history program tells the heroic stories of America’s black warriors spanning the past 400 years. The program includes authentic military artifacts, re-enactors, and military veterans sharing their own personal stories. Visitors can interact with the re-enactors, hear stories of actual soldiers who served, and examine items of military life from each period of military history as they explore the historic home-turned-museum.
The Trent House is located at 15 Market Street, Trenton. Visit www.williamtrenthouse.org for more information.
Trenton Free Public Library
The library, located at 120 Academy Street, Trenton, hosts “Witness to History” on Wednesday, February 11, from 4 to 5 p.m. The free, family-friendly event features educator and historic interpreter Leslie Bramlett in full period dress for a presentation of colonial women of color in Washington’s household. Visit www.trentonlib.org/event/witness-to-history-2 for more information.
Arts Council of Princeton
The Rays of Hope living museum, based in Jackson, visits the Arts Council on Sunday, February 22, from 3 to 6 p.m.
The free experience for all ages highlights the remarkable contributions of Black individuals throughout history.
The Arts Council is located at 102 Witherspoon Street, Princeton. Visit www.artscouncilofprinceton.org for more information.
Books & Movies
New Jersey State Library
The New Jersey State Library screens the three-part, New York Emmy Award-nominated PBS documentary “The Price of Silence” on Saturday, February 21, from noon to 2 p.m. at the New Jersey State Museum Auditorium, 205 West State Street, Trenton.
Part one of the series discusses the importance of slaves to the state’s agriculture-dependent economy. When New Jersey became one of the last northern states to begin the process of abolition, in 1804, more than 12,000 men, women, and children were still enslaved in the state.
The second part covers the continuing repercussions of slavery in New Jersey, including inequities in income, healthcare, and more in comparison with the White community.
The final part of the series looks specifically at the migration of the Black community from the South to Newark during the Jim Crow era in the early 20th century. Their stories are told through the eyes of their descendants.
A panel discussion follows the screening. Speakers include producer Ridgeley Hutchinson and documentary contributors Dr. Linda J. Caldwell Epps, president and CEO of 1804 Consultants; Beverly Mills, author and founder of Stoutsburg Sourland African American Museum; Toni Hendrix, founder and president, Lost Souls Public Memorial Project; Assemblywoman Shavonda Sumter, and Dr. Damali Campbell-Oparaji, Chief of Ambulatory Care Services, Rutgers New Jersey Medical School.
The event is free, but registration is required. Visit www.njstatelib.org/thepriceofsilence.
Princeton Public Library
The library is holding two upcoming author events that feature books related to Black history.
Author Andrew S. Curran is joined in conversation by Flora Champy and Murielle Perrier on Wednesday, February 18, from 6 to 7 p.m. for a presentation on his new book, “Biography of a Dangerous Idea: A New History of Race from Louis XIV to Thomas Jefferson.”
Curran is a professor of the humanities at Wesleyan University. His new book, released February 10, is an “investigation of how thirteen key Enlightenment figures shaped the concept of race,” according to a statement from the publisher, Penguin Random House.
“Moving from the gilded halls of Versailles to the slave plantations of the Caribbean, from the court of the Mughal Empire to the drawing rooms of Monticello, “Biography of a Dangerous Idea” not only reveals the Enlightenment’s entanglement with empire and oppression — it offers a bold reassessment of the era’s most celebrated luminaries.”
In conversation with Curran are Champy, a professor of French at Princeton whose work focuses on 18th-century French political literature and philosophy, and Perrier, a senior lecturer and associate director of the French program at Princeton, whose interests include 18th-century literature and contemporary Madagascan culture and literature.
Register for the free event at princetonlibrary.libnet.info/event/15622671.
Author Shatema Threadcraft presents her new book, “The Labors of Resurrection: Black Women, Necromancy, and Morrisonian Democracy” on Monday, February 23, from 6 to 7 p.m.
Threadcraft is an associate professor of gender and sexuality studies at Vanderbilt University. In addition to “The Labors of Resurrection,” published last year by Oxford University Press, she is also the author of “Intimate Justice: The Black Female Body and the Body Politic.”
The publisher describes her most recent work in the following statement:
“Black grief and Black death are among the most important forces in contemporary American politics. As Shatema Threadcraft argues in “The Labors of Resurrection,” spectacular death — experienced publicly and violently — has given rise to global political movements, but it has also had an important gendered effect that has complicated Black women’s relationship to the ‘Black people.’ Though Black women face a crisis of premature death, they are unlikely to experience violence in public ways. Their deaths are most often instances of intimate partner violence and occur in private when most large-scale Black political mobilization centers on deaths that are spectacular.
“Profiling Ida B. Wells, Mamie Till-Bradley, Clementine Barfield, Barbara Smith, and Margaret Prescod, Threadcraft highlights how the centrality of spectacular death has functioned to marginalize Black women in the stories of Black peoplehood and has ensured that they are not the main beneficiaries of large-scale Black political mobilization. Black women receive ample, if largely symbolic, recognition for keeping Black communities alive, but they have not received the recognition they are due for their role in memorializing the Black dead. Threadcraft builds on her award-winning scholarship about Black women’s access to intimate life and democratic freedom, to consider how state officials, Black activists, and others assign meaning to the racial politics of Black suffering. In so doing, she looks at the challenge that contemporary feminist activists face in attempting to make visible Black women within the Black political sphere.”
Threadcraft is joined in conversation by Reena Goldthree, associate professor of African American studies at Princeton University. Register for the free event at princetonlibrary.libnet.info/event/15573553.
Princeton Public Library is located at 65 Witherspoon Street, Princeton. Visit www.princetonlibrary.org for more information.
Mercer County Library
The county library system hosts a virtual talk featuring Lindsey Stewart, author of “Mojos, Mermaids, Medicine, and 400 Years of Black Women’s Magic,” on Thursday, February 12, from 2 to 3 p.m.
Stewart is a Black feminist philosopher and an associate professor of philosophy at the University of Memphis. She is also the author of “The Politics of Black Joy.”
Her new book tells the stories of Negro Mammies of slavery; the Voodoo Queens and Blues Women of Reconstruction; and the Granny Midwives and textile weavers of the Jim Crow era. These women, in secrecy and subterfuge, courageously and devotedly continued their practices and worship for centuries and passed down their traditions.
Registration for the free event is available at events.mcl.org.
Community Gatherings
Trenton Free Public Library
On Saturday, February 21, the library hosts a Black History Month celebration featuring a full schedule of events from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. for the whole family.
Throughout the day, local authors will be promoting their books and community organizations will have tables offering information and services to attendees.
An open mic with Todd Evans — the Trenton born poet, community organizer, and frequent host of spoken word events — runs from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. At the same time, teens are invited to a Oversimplified watch party. The YouTube channel uses animated videos to explain historic people and events. And younger children can keep busy with an African drum craft.
Lunch, from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m., is “A Taste of Soul,” catered by Trenton restaurant 1911 Smoke House Barbeque. An exhibit of Trentoniana will also be on view at that time.
At 2 p.m., award-winning Willingboro-based storyteller, teaching artist, and folklorist Queen Nur performs.
The event concludes with a community photo-op from 3 to 4 p.m. Visit www.trentonlib.org/event/black-history-month-event.
Douglass Day
Frederick Douglass, the noted 19th century abolitionist, orator, and statesman, never knew his actual birthday but chose to celebrate on Valentine’s Day, February 14. Since 2017, his adopted birthday has been celebrated as Douglass Day, marked by gatherings to create new and free resources for learning about Black history.
These gatherings frequently take the form of “Transcribe-a-Thons,” or crowd-sourced transcription projects, based on a specific theme. This year’s projects focus on the 14th Amendment, ratified in 1866, and its impact on civil rights.
Several Douglass Day events will be held at Princeton-area venues, all on Friday, February 13, from noon to 3 p.m. Transcription efforts focus on The Colored Conventions Project, an effort founded at the University of Delaware to digitize 70 years of 19th century Black history. Attendees are encouraged to bring their own laptops.
Host sites are:
Mercer County Library Hopewell Branch, 245 Pennington-Titusville Road, Pennington. Light refreshments served. Call 609-737-2610 or visit events.mcl.org for more information or to register.
Princeton Public Library, 65 Witherspoon Street, Princeton. A cake cutting at 1 p.m. accompanies transcription work. Visit princetonlibrary.org
Pennington Public Library at Pennington Borough Hall, 30 North Main Street, Pennington. Sweet treats will be provided. Visit www.penningtonlibrary.org.
Stoutsburg Sourland African American Museum at the Reasoner-True House, 189 Hollow Road, Skillman. The event includes a cake cutting at 1 p.m. Visit www.ssaamuseum.org/frederick-douglass-day for more information.
In addition to transcription events, Firestone Library at Princeton University hosts a pop-up display of rare materials by and about Frederick Douglass and other works highlighting African American history in its Special Collections department from 2 to 4 p.m. on Friday, February 13.
Visit www.douglassday.org for more information.
Historic interpreter and educator Leslie Bramlett leads the ‘Witness to History’ event at Trenton Library on February 11.,
A promotional image from the PBS documentary ‘The Price of Silence’ being screened at the State Museum on Saturday, February 21. ,
February 12.
A promotional image from the PBS documentary ‘The Price of Silence’ being screened at the State Museum on Saturday
