Juneteenth Luncheon explores what freedom means
BY TODD LUCK
THE CHRONICLE
The Juneteenth
Luncheon commemorated
the 150th anniversary of
__emanetpation from slavery
with accounts from those
who experienced it, read by
University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill his
tory professor Dr. Reginald
Hildebrand.
The luncheon was held
June 4 at Old Salem
Museum and Gardens,
which contains the historic
St. Phillips Moravian
Church, where emancipa
tion was announced for
local slaves in 1865.
Juneteenth celebrates the
end of slavery in the United
States. It is held on or
around June 19, when
Union forces arrived in
Galveston, Texas, with
news of the end of slavery
on June 19, 1865.
Juneteenth is normally
known as a large festive
celebration, filled with
food and entertainment as
well as black history and
culture. The luncheon is a
different way to explore the
end of slavery.
"It gives people a
chance to sit down and hear
the entire story," said
Cheryl Harry, Old Salem's
director of African
American programing and
founder of Triad Cultural
Arts, which organizes the
local Juneteenth festival.
Harry said there's
always something new to
say about emancipation.
Last year, when "12 Years a
Slave" won a Golden
Globe for Best Dramatic
Film (and went on to win
the Oscar for Best Picture)
and "Django Unchained"
was released, the luncheon
explored Hollywood's
depictions of slavery. This
year, the focus was on what
slaves did when they were
free.
Dr. Corey D.B. Walker,
the dean of the Winston
Salem State University's
College of Arts, Sciences,
Business and Education,
asked what freedom really
meant as he introduced the
speaker. He quoted a dis
sertation by Hildebrand:
"Emancipation had only
determined that blacks
would no longer be slaves;
it said nothing about what
they would be."
Hildebrand is an associ
ate professor of African
American Studies and
History at UNC-Chapel
Hill. His research focuses
on the Emancipation and
the Reconstruction periods.
He read firsthand accounts
from various historical doc
uments describing the
announcement of emanci
pation in churches and the
jubilant celebrations that
followed.
"To most of the four
million black folk emanci
pated by civil war, God was
real." he said
"He was real; they had
meet him personally."
There was celebration
like never before on that
July 4th in Raleigh and
deafening applause when
the Declaration of
Independence was read. It
was the first true
Independence Day the for
mer slaves had experi
enced.
But newfound hope met
sobering realities as
Hildebrand described the
sadness that former slaves
had when Union forces left.
Their presence was all that
protected them from their
former masters and the
society that enslaved them.
He read accounts of blacks
being denied the ability to
rent or buy land and others
having to pay high rents.
He read from a black
officer's observations, that
some Union soldiers near
Tarboro where actually
helping former masters
keep their slaves, and in
Raleigh white people
where running blacks off
their lots because they
dared go to school.
"If the whites here had
or could have their way,
there would not be a free
colored man in the state,"
read Hildebrand.
Hildebrand described a
convention in Raleigh in
which 150 black delegates
discussed the best way to
define and secure freedom.
They came up with a list of
freedoms they hoped to
secure: the right to testify
in court, serve on a jury, to
act as council in court and
to vote.
"In other words, they
insisted on being able to be
involved in and respected
by the criminal justice sys
tem, so that it would be
operajwl openly and fairly,"
he sad. "And they also
insisted on the right to vote.
One hundred and fifty
years later, we are still
insisting on and defending
those rights."
He closed with a notice
published in a national
newspaper by former slave,
Hagar Outlaw. She was
looking for her children
who had gone to separate
masters. In her plea that
they would some day find
their mother again, she
addressed her former mas
ter, Dr. Hugh Outlaw, ask
ing him to let her children
know she's alive if he
found them. The carefully
worded sentence did not
address him as "Master,"
"Dr." or even "Mr.," which
Hildebrand said sent a mes
sage to her former master.
"With those words, 1
can hear that lady saying
with dignified defiance:
'You have done your worst
and 1 am still here. I am still
strong, and my dignity and
my humanity and my love
for my children could not
be destroyed," he said.
He said that he didn't
know if Hagar Outlaw ever
found her children.
After his talk, he said
the backlash against freed
slaves was common across
the South and in the North,
blacks faced tension with
white workers, who were
scared the freedmen would
take their jobs. He said
freed slaves had tremen
dous tenacity in building
their new lives, but that it
was crushed and oppressed
by white people in that
period using violence, dis
crimination and new laws.
Former masters wanted to
keep blacks as a cheap,
controlled agricultural
labor force, so they tried to
prevent blacks from gain
ing education, becoming
entrepreneurs and achiev
ing political power.
Also during the lunch
eon, the Cedric S. Rodney
Unity Award was given to
Joycelyn Johnson and Rev.
Stephen McCutchan for
their work in the communi
ty. Johnson is a longtime
community activist and for
mer City Council member.
McCutchan is a retired pas
tor who worked to bridge
the racial divide and helped
found the Presbyterian
Inter-Racial Dialogue.
The local Juneteenth
festival will be June 20 at
the corner of Martin Luther
King Drive and Fifth
Street, around the Winston
Mutual Building, from 11
am. to 6 pm.
Samm-Art Williams' play
'Home' to be read
nationwide on Monday
Playwright to be in Winston-Salem for reading
SPECIAL TO THE CHRONICLE
Project 1 VOICE, a national organiza
tion whose mission is to strengthen and
promote African- American theater and
playwrights, will present staged readings
of "Home" by Samm-Art Williams of
North Carolina to honor the 35th anniver
sary year of the play's Broadway debut.
TTte North Carolina Black Repertory
Company, 610 Coliseum Drive, Suite 1, in
Winston-Salem, will participate in the
staged readings on Monday, June 15. Call
336-723-2266 between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m.
Monday through Friday for more informa
tion, or email info@ncblackrep.org.
Williams will be present at the reading in
Winston-Salem.
The fifth annual
1V01CE/1PLAY/1DAY event will also
commemorate another milestone ? this
one in civil rights ? the 150th anniversary
of the 13th Amendment to the U.S.
Constitution. This amendment ended slav
ery and involuntary servitude in America,
officially making the United States of
America home for any then-enslaved per
sons and their descendants.
This international theater experience,
including over 30 black theaters, museums
and diverse institutions throughout the
world, will feature prominent actors
including Negro Ensemble Company
(NEC) alums and local enthusiasts.
Many NEC alums will return to their
HOME-towns to participate in what
Project! VOICE refers to as HOME-com
ings. These events will explore the mean
ing of home ?Is it a place, a state of mind
or both? The readings will be followed by
a panel discussion with Negro Ensemble
Company alumni and enthusiasts in select
cities.
"Home" received great acclaim at NEC
in 1979, transferring to Broadway's Cort
Theatre on May 7, 1980. The original cast
starred Charles Brown, L. Scott Caldwell
and Michele Shay with direction by NEC
co-founder Douglas Turner Ward. The
play ran for 278 performances.
About "Home"
"Home" is a brilliantly inventive, lyri
cally expressive play deals joyfully with
the coming of age of a young black man
from rural South Carolina. The action
begins on the small farm in South Carolina
that Cephus Miles, an orphan, has inherit
ed from his family. Young and strong, he is
content to work the land ? until his child
hood sweetheart rejects him and goes off
to college. Not believing in the Vietnam
War, Cephus is imprisoned as a draft evad
er for refusing to serve. By the time he is
released, Cephus has lost his land to the tax
collector so he heads north to build a new
life. With a good job and a slinky new girl
friend) he finds the big city exciting and
rewarding. But soon after, the dream
begins to fiufe?Cephus loses his job and
becomes involved in drugs and prostitu
tion. Pulling himself together, he returns to
South Carolina and settles back on the land
with his old sweetheart. Despite all, he has
never lost his joyous goodwill, his
indomitable spirit and the conviction that
one day his quest for fulfillment will be
"Home" is a bril
liantly inventive,
lyrically expressive
play deals joyfully
with the coming of
age of a young
black man from
rural South
Carolina."
rewarded
About the playwright Samm-Art
Williams
Samm-Art Williams was born in
Burgaw. North Carolina. He is an
American playwright and screenwriter,
and a stage and film/TV actor. He entered
New York City theater as an actor in 1973,
performing with New York's famed Negro
Ensemble Company. Much of his work as
writer concerns the African-American
experience. He was nominated for a Tony
Award and a Drama Desk Award for his
play Home (1979), which moved from the
Negro Ensemble Company to a Broadway
production in 1980. Among his television
credits Williams wrote the PBS produc
tions Kneeslappers and Experiment in
Freedom; episodes for the series Cagney
and Lacey, The New Mike Hammer,
Miami Vice and The Fresh Prince of Bel
Air and the NBC special Motown Returns
to the Apollo (1986), among other work.
He received two Emmy nominations for
his work for TV series. Among his other
plays are The Dance on Widows' Row, The
Waiting Room and Montford Point Marin.
Williams
Bwmm
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