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Amazon's recent fail is getting plenty of attention for good reason, but another issue has come to my attention:
save freeman houses - saving history.
We need your help. Bridgeport, Connecticut is the home of the oldest homes built by African Americans in this State - the Mary and Eliza Freeman Houses. Our community would like to restore these houses and eventually turn them into a history center in the tradition of the Anacostia Community Museum and house a nonprofit organization that will serve the community.
The Freeman Houses are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. “Unique survivals”, they tell a the story of a forgotten community. The Freeman Houses are the only surviving homes of Bridgeport’s “Little Liberia” - a seafaring community of free people of color that thrived from the 1820s to the 1850s. Before Bridgeport was chartered, before US slavery ended, free Blacks born here, in the Caribbean and Cape Verde, runaway slaves, and members of Indian tribes lived and worked together. Evidence points to Ethiope’s having been a major depot on the Underground Railroad, with Shinnecock Indians ferrying runaways across the Sound under cover of darkness.
[...]
The National Park Service considers the Mary & Eliza Freeman Houses significant to Women’s History and African American History. Mary (1815-1883) and Eliza (1805-1862) overcame significant obstacles as women of color in nineteenth-century America. The story of their success could serve as inspiration to many. By the time Mary died she had parlayed her investments to holdings of $30,000 to $50,000, a fortune for that time. There was only one Bridgeporter of greater wealth - the legendary showman, P.T. Barnum. Ethiope was a remarkable community with churches, a school, lending library, and a four-story hotel - 36 buildings in all. The men of Little Liberia were in the main employed as seamen on whalers and West Indies schooners. Little Liberia’s sons served in the Civil War.
To save this house, we need $98,000.00 by May 18th. If you've got the cash to spare, please donate. Or at least spread the word. Or if you got the hook up to Obama maybe he can make a pretty speech for it and get the money in no time.
save freeman houses - saving history.
We need your help. Bridgeport, Connecticut is the home of the oldest homes built by African Americans in this State - the Mary and Eliza Freeman Houses. Our community would like to restore these houses and eventually turn them into a history center in the tradition of the Anacostia Community Museum and house a nonprofit organization that will serve the community.
The Freeman Houses are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. “Unique survivals”, they tell a the story of a forgotten community. The Freeman Houses are the only surviving homes of Bridgeport’s “Little Liberia” - a seafaring community of free people of color that thrived from the 1820s to the 1850s. Before Bridgeport was chartered, before US slavery ended, free Blacks born here, in the Caribbean and Cape Verde, runaway slaves, and members of Indian tribes lived and worked together. Evidence points to Ethiope’s having been a major depot on the Underground Railroad, with Shinnecock Indians ferrying runaways across the Sound under cover of darkness.
[...]
The National Park Service considers the Mary & Eliza Freeman Houses significant to Women’s History and African American History. Mary (1815-1883) and Eliza (1805-1862) overcame significant obstacles as women of color in nineteenth-century America. The story of their success could serve as inspiration to many. By the time Mary died she had parlayed her investments to holdings of $30,000 to $50,000, a fortune for that time. There was only one Bridgeporter of greater wealth - the legendary showman, P.T. Barnum. Ethiope was a remarkable community with churches, a school, lending library, and a four-story hotel - 36 buildings in all. The men of Little Liberia were in the main employed as seamen on whalers and West Indies schooners. Little Liberia’s sons served in the Civil War.
To save this house, we need $98,000.00 by May 18th. If you've got the cash to spare, please donate. Or at least spread the word. Or if you got the hook up to Obama maybe he can make a pretty speech for it and get the money in no time.