In observance of Black History Month, I’ll do a book talk at the Williamsburg-area site of one of America’s earliest free black settlements.
Freedom Park, a James City County public park, contains three reconstructed cabins where life in the early 19th-century settlement is interpreted for visitors.
I’ll be on the program Saturday, Feb. 22, at 12:30 p.m. in the park’s interpretive center to talk about my book, Uncle George and Me: Two Southern Families Confront a Shared Legacy of Slavery. It tells the tale of my slave-owning Virginia ancestors, the people they enslaved, and their descendants.
When I’m done, at 3 p.m. there’ll be a presentation by Col. Lafayette Jones, a descendant of those who lived in the historic settlement. The program is jointly sponsored by Freedom Park and the Historic Triangle chapter of Coming to the Table, a national nonprofit dedicated to racial reconciliation.
The park is at 5537 Centerville Road, Williamsburg.