XPost: alt.genealogy, soc.history, alt.history

Finding Our Roots museum celebrating second anniversary

By Scott Yoshonis Staff Writer
Posted Feb 2, 2019 at 9:03 AM

The Finding Our Roots African American Museum will celebrate its
second anniversary on Feb. 9, and you're invited.

Some of the highlights of the celebration will be unveiling of the
museum's Historical Landmark designation, the introduction of the
Memorial Bricks project and the Georgetown Memorial Slave exhibition.

The celebration will be an all-day affair, with actors portraying
historical figures and teaching attendees about their stories.

Museum President Margie Scoby said the response to the museum's first
two years in operation has been "awesome."

"People are coming from all over the country and our local people have
embraced the idea," Scoby said. "We have people constantly coming in
with stories and memorabilia, artifacts, data. We had a group come
through from Wisconsin, and some of the things we went through, they
said they had no idea."

From 10:30 a.m. until 4:30 p.m., actors portraying such historical
figures as Frank Campbell, will inform and entertain. Campbell is one
of the 272 slaves sold en masse by Georgetown College (later
Georgetown University) in Washington, D.C., in 1838 to pay off debts
by the college and help keep it afloat.

There is a local connection to that particular event. Many of the
descendants of those Georgetown slaves, sometimes referred to as the
GU272, live in Terrebonne Parish.

Other actor-portrayed historical figures scheduled to "appear" are
Abdul Rahman, an African prince who was enslaved for over 40 years,
Jack Conrad and Mahaila Washington, victims of the Thibidaux Massacre,
several mulatto women of New Orleans and Clementine Hunter, a
self-taught black artist.

There will also be musical artists, visual artists and featured
speakers at the event.

"The mere fact that we are here for our story, and those people who do
don't know about who we are and what we have contributed to the
country, it's awesome," Scoby said.

Finding Our Roots African American Museum is at 918 Roussel St. in
Houma.

Staff Writer Scott Yoshonis can be reached at 850-1148 or syoshonis@houmatoday.com. Follow him on Twitter @Foster_Cajun.

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