WARREN, Ohio- As life-long Warren resident, historian, veteran, and former Safety Service Director Frederick Harris will tell you, true Black history is not often taught in schools.
So he’s doing his part to expound upon personal experience of growing up in the city of Warren in Northeast Ohio.
What You Need To Know
- Perhaps in these trying times, understanding the past can lead to a better understand of the world we’re in today
- Members of a Northeast Ohio Historical Society is doing its part to share African American History
- It’s all apart of Trumbull County’s #BlackHistoryFridays Initiative
“I tell younger people when an older black person dies, its the same as a library burning down, you’ve lost that history forever. There’s no other people on the face of this earth that has a history as black people have,” says Harris.
And to make sure that local African American history doesn’t get lost in time, Harris and others from the Trumbull County Historical Society have created Black History Fridays, a social media campaign on its Facebook and Instagram Pages.
Each week is placing the spotlight on a particular time, person, or moment in the city’s rich history.
Featuring the likes of Carrie Green Mountain, the first black woman to own property in Trumbull County, who upon passing left $20-thousand dollars to the local Salvation Army, which still stands today.
Or the city’s Packard Pool, which became desegregated by African American pioneer civil rights attorney and Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall and leading the way for other Black leaders in Warren.
“And that swimming pool played an integral part here in the city of Warren because that’s one of the reasons why we had our first Black Safety Service Director Bob Dawson,” says Harris.
Stacey Adger is a lifelong resident of the Mahoning Valley and says not a lot of people realize the important history that happened in their own back yard.
She says it’s emotional what’s taking place today, and she hopes it leads to great change and better context for Black History.
“I’m so proud of the younger generation stepping forward. It’s almost as if they’re picking up the torch where the older generation you know had to drop it because they had run into so many brick walls,” says Adger.
Harris says he can remember in his younger days fighting for the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which prohibited discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.
And when it comes to the Black Lives Matter movement, the goal is the same, but now its a global rallying cry.
“Black men and black women are still dying at the hands of police—same way we did it back in the 60s. Only now you have cameras to record it. What’s taking place today, the entire world has united for the Black cause. I never thought I’d see that in my lifetime,” says Harris.
For more on the Trumbull County Historical Society, visit their website:
