Albert Wisner Public Library celebrates Black History with words, music and art

February is Black History Month, a time to recognize, celebrate, and honor the rich and diverse history and important contributions and achievements of African Americans.

The Albert Wisner Public Library is celebrating all month with free events and programs.

To attend any or all of these programs please register. Registration is available online at albertwisnerlibrary.org or by calling the library at 986-1047 ext. 3.

Hudson Valley Ebony Strings

Sunday, Feb. 2, at 2 p.m.

Join us for an afternoon of beautiful music performed by a chamber orchestra comprised of young and talented African American string players.

Poems of the People with Beverly Braxton

Wednesday, Feb. 19, at 6:30 p.m.

Beverly Braxton shares selected poems from “Remember the Bridge: Poems of a People,” by Carole Boston Weatherford. The collection summarizes the broad span of African American history.

Striking archival engravings and photographs accompany these poems, which focus on famous men and women, ordinary folks and legendary heroes who made their people proud.

For All Eternity with Marc Mathelier

Friday, Feb. 21, 7 p.m.

Marc Mathelier will take you on a musical romantic voyage celebrating love, life and music. His mastery of the guitar and his variety of styles make him a virtuoso.

Freedom: Emancipation and Its Legacies

Now through Thursday, Feb. 6, on the main floor of the library.

This exhibition examines the story of emancipation from 1850 to 1964, focusing on how, due to the persistence of African Americans, abolitionists and politicians, the Civil War became an “abolition war,” how the Emancipation Proclamation of January 1863 and the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments transformed the Constitution of the United States; and how we continue to debate the legacies of slavery and emancipation and reach for the goal of equality.

These programs made possible by a generous gift to the Albert Wisner Public Library Foundation by Glenn P. and Susan D. Dickes.

Also coming up at the Library

Beyond Susan B. Anthony with Prof. Susan Ingalls Lewis, SUNY New Paltz

Thursday, Feb. 6, 6:30 p.m.

This year 2020 is 100th Anniversary of the ratification of the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote.

Who was responsible for winning the vote for women and why was New York the first state east of the Mississippi to allow women full suffrage in all elections? This talk will move beyond the well-known Seneca Falls Declaration of 1848 to introduce a new set of strategies and cast of characters: Miriam Leslie, Carrie Chapman Catt, Mary Garret Hay, Rose Schneiderman, Mary Talbert and a flock of leaflet-dropping aviatrixes, among others.