- Events and Workshops
Shining Light on Truth (RECAP)
Date
Nov 20, 2024
Time
4:30 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.
Location
New Haven Museum, 114 Whitney Ave, New Haven, CT 06510
Topic
Presenter(s)
Michael Morand
Event Recap
On Nov. 20, The Foundation welcomed guests to the New Haven Museum for a special guided viewing of Shining Light on Truth: New Haven, Yale, and Slavery with City Historian Michael Morand. The archival materials on display and Morand's presentation and tour illuminated the essential role of enslaved and free Black people in the history of Yale, New Haven and Connecticut. Morand, who co-curated the exhibit, also detailed how New Haven leaders gathered in 1831 to block a proposed all-Black college that could have been the first HBCU in the United States.
What We Heard
- Experiencing the archives of Black presence and contributions in a physical space is a powerful way for us to acknowledge and deal with the omissions and silence in the dominant narrative of our past.
- Slavery was commonplace in colonial Connecticut and foundational to the development of New Haven and Yale.
- Connecticut did not fully abolish slavery until 1848.
- Our state’s laws and practices led abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison to call Connecticut, “the Georgia of New England.”
- 7 of the 10 founding ministers of Yale College, all leading Connecticut clergymen, were enslavers.
- 32 of the next 53 Yale trustees, also all Connecticut leaders, were enslavers.
- In 1831, an all-Black college proposed for New Haven was defeated by a vote of 700 to 4.
- Free and enslaved Black laborers were essential to the construction of Yale's Connecticut Hall, completed in 1752.
- Yale did not embrace attempts to fully reckon with the institution's ties to slavery until the Black Lives Matter protests following the murder of George Floyd.
Resources for You
Shining Light on Truth will be exhibited until March 1, 2025
Wednesday – Friday, 10 am to 5 pm, Saturday, 12 to 5 pm.
New Haven Museum,114 Whitney Ave, New Haven
Museum admission is free during the exhibit’s run, made possible by Yale University.
Contact Joanna Steinberg, Director of Learning and Engagement, New Haven Museum, if you would like to schedule a group tour at 203-562-4183, ext. 111 or email Joanna.
View the free ebook, videos, a walking tour and other related resources at the Yale and Slavery Research Project website.
The narrative history, Yale and Slavery: A History, by David W. Blight with the Yale and Slavery Research Project, was published by Yale University Press in February 2024. This narrative history is a comprehensive examination of how slavery and resistance to it have shaped this university. Download a copy by clinking on the book cover image or CLICK HERE. Print copies of Yale and Slavery may be purchased at bookstores, online retailers, or the Yale University Press website.
Speaker Michael Morand
Morand is director of community engagement at Beinecke Library. He authored a chapter in the recently published book, Yale and Slavery: A History and has been a leader in the research project. A New Havener for four decades, he was appointed the official City Historian by the Mayor of New Haven in April 2024. He chairs the Friends of the Grove Street Cemetery and is on the boards for the Dixwell Q House and The Community Foundation.