The #ROCDouglass Consortium presents a celebration of the 199th anniversary of Frederick Douglass’s birth on February 14, 2017 at his gravesite in Mount Hope Cemetery in Rochester, New York.
According to New York Times columnist, Charles Blow, “Douglass was one of the most brilliant thinkers, writers, orators America has ever produced. Furthermore, he harnessed and mastered the media of his day. Writing an acclaimed autobiography, establishing his own newspaper and becoming the most photographed American of the 19th century.”
Blow is not alone in his esteem, President Abraham Lincoln called Frederick Douglass “one of the most meritorious men, if not the most meritorious man in the United States.”
Frederick Douglass was a citizen of Rochester, New York, during one of the most consequential chapters of his illustrious life. He established The North Star, an anti-slavery newspaper, in the city in 1847. The newspaper’s motto was prescient, with a 21st century-like understanding of the intersectionality of oppression. Its motto was “Right is of no sex-Truth is of no color-God is the father of us all, and we are brethren.”
Unlike more modern men and women who can tell the day and exact time they were born and under what moon, it seems especially important to commemorate Douglass’ bicentennial because of the relative inconsequentiality of slaves’ births. In the “Life and Times of Frederick Douglass,” Douglass said – “I never met with a slave in that part of the country who could tell me with any certainty how old he was. Few at that time knew anything of the months of the year or the days of the month. They measured the ages of their children by spring-time, winter-time, harvest-time, planting-time, and the like. Masters allowed no questions concerning their ages to be put to them by slaves. I suppose myself to have been born in 1817.”
Frederick Douglass was born in either 1817 or 1818, but per his autobiography, “Life and Times of Frederick Douglass,” he was born in about 1817.
The event producers, #ROCDouglass Consortium – consists of three members/organizations, including:
· Neelum Films, Mara Ahmed (Founder)
· AmandaChestnut.com, Amanda Chestnut
· 21st Century Arts, Rachel DeGuzman
Produced in affiliation with Flower City Arts Center, Writers and Books, North Star Players, DUNWOOD? Visual Consulting, PeaceArt International, the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence, City of Rochester Mount Hope Cemetery, the Frederick Douglass Institute for African-American Studies: University of Rochester and more.
When:
Tuesday, February 14, 2017 – 11:45 am to 1:15 pm. The program will begin promptly at noon.
Where:
Mt. Hope Cemetery, 1133 Mt. Hope Avenue, Rochester, New York 14620. Douglass’ grave is in section T, plot 26. Attendees will enter the cemetery in the south entrance opposite The Distillery Restaurant. The address for the office is 1133 Mount Hope Ave. Drive in and take a right where the drive-in road ends. (very short distance). Go to the first intersection but continue going up the slight incline. The next marker is a small pond on your left that is having work done on it. Guests should park in that area and continue walking a short distance up the road (keeping to your right) There will be a historic marker with Frederick’s name on it and right next to it a gravel walkway. Go down the walkway towards Mt. Hope Ave. a short distance and you will see the walkway goes to the left. Follow that to the end. It ends at Frederick Douglass’s grave.
Program:
· Welcome and introduction to Frederick Douglass
· Contemporary inspirations/testimonials including Spiritual by Thomas Warfield,
readings by Banke Awopetu-McCullogh, Shawn Dunwoody and Lu Highsmith
· Attendee participation/recitation of Frederick Douglass quotes
· Frederick Douglass reenactment by David Shakes/North Star Players
· Interfaith prayer by Melanie Duguid-May
Handout text:
On December 3, 1947 Frederick Douglass published the first issue of the anti-slavery The North Star newspaper in Rochester, New York. Its motto was “Right is of no sex-Truth is of no color-God is the father of us all, and we are brethren.”
