7615: KYW: Incredible Story of Freedom on Display (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Guy Antoine <GuyAntoine@windowsonhaiti.com>

Incredible Story of Freedom on Display
By KYW's Karin Phillips

A new exhibition at the African American Museum in Philadelphia tells the
incredible story of a group of 19th-century Philadelphians who emigrated
to Haiti in search of freedom and independence.

"Once We Were Americans -- Photographs by Max Belcher" tells the story
of 350 members of Philadelphia's African-American community who, in 1824,
emigrated to Samana, then part of the Haiti Republic and today the Dominican
Republic, in search of freedom and dignity.

Education director Naomi Nelson says the early 1820s were a time for political
and social unrest for America, and there were calls from Haiti and other parts
of the world for adventurous émigrés:

"So you're talking about people who had a choice to either stay here and have
limited freedom, or to leave and have full freedom. They sacrificed the known
to enter into the unknown in order to be free."

The exhibit will be at the AAMP at 7th and Arch through September 16th.