Journalist A’lelia Bundles reflects on the 1916 Emancipation Day Reunion of formerly enslaved persons and how the images she discovered had a particular effect on herself and others. Ms. Bundles continued her search as her curiosity grew to find the photographs of ex-slaves taken on that day. Here is an excerpt from her article, “Four Free Women: 1916 Emancipation Reunion”:
“I couldn’t stop staring at the photo. Four elderly black women, ‘all older than 100, at a convention in the District in 1916,’ said the caption in last Friday’s Washington Post…Within a few minutes of online research, though, I discovered two more photos taken on the same day in 1916 by Harris & Ewing at an Emancipation reunion. As the official White House photographers of the early 1900s and then the nation’s largest photo news service, they rarely snapped shots of African Americans.”
“I have, however, found out more about the reunion. The Washington Post ran at least six articles between September 23 and November 6, 1916 about the activities at Cosmopolitan Baptist Temple. ‘Colored people of the District are cooperating in efforts to make the affair a success,’ the Post reported. ‘Arrangements have been made to have vehicles of all kinds ready to carry the aged folk about the city.” Another article announced that ‘five thousand free dinner tickets will be distributed among the colored churches of Washington to be turned over to those who attend the fifty-fourth convention of former slaves and former owners.'”
For the full article, click here.
Visit her on Facebook at A’Lelia Bundles and at Helping Ourselves.
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