Zion Freetown 230

Historic Freetown - One Journey symposium highlights Part 3 (Sep-Oct 2022)

A virtual 'One Journey' symposium held September 30-October 1, 2022 was the third in a series and featured speakers in Jamaica, Canada, United States, and Freetown West Africa. This symposium highlights different perspectives and contributions of the journeys and legacies of Jamaican Maroons, African-Caribbean connections, and the founding of Historic Maroon Town in Africa 222 years ago in 1800. https://m.youtube.com/@africancurator6197/videos Part 3 African-Caribbean Music & Culture Iyamide Thomas, Curator and Historian Adrian Q. Labor Adesina During AfriCaribbean Festival - Empress Jalloh & Danny Labor Organized by Adrian Q. Labor & Akindele T.M. Decker of African Curator, Barbara Morgan of Zion 230, Adesina During of KDU-Global, in partnership with the Freetown City Council.

Historic Freetown - One Journey symposium highlights Part 2 (Sep-Oct 2022)

A virtual 'One Journey' symposium held September 30-October 1, 2022 was the third in a series and featured speakers in Jamaica, Canada, United States, and Freetown West Africa. This symposium highlights different perspectives and contributions of the journeys and legacies of Jamaican Maroons, African-Caribbean connections, and the founding of Historic Maroon Town in Africa 222 years ago in 1800. https://m.youtube.com/@africancurator6197/videos Part 2 West Indians in Sierra Leone - Dr. Nemata Blyden, Historian & Professor, George Washington University - Natassja Bynoe, The African Diaspora Institute of Cultural Exchange and Historical Research, Inc. Liberated African Emigration to West Indies & West Indian Immigration - Adrian Q. Labor - Akindele T.M. Decker Creolized Languages: Krio, Jamaican Patois, Gullah, Suriname Creole - Dr. Malcolm Finney Organized by Adrian Q. Labor & Akindele T.M. Decker of African Curator, Barbara Morgan of Zion 230, Adesina During of KDU-Global, in partnership with the Freetown City Council.

Historic Freetown - One Journey symposium highlights Part 1 (Sep-Oct 2022)

A virtual 'One Journey' symposium held September 30-October 1, 2022 was the third in a series and featured speakers in Jamaica, Canada, United States, and Freetown West Africa. This symposium highlights different perspectives and contributions of the journeys and legacies of Jamaican Maroons, African-Caribbean connections, and the founding of Historic Maroon Town in Africa 222 years ago in 1800. Part 1 - Speakers touch on the lived experience of their common African history and their communities' shared heritage. https://m.youtube.com/@africancurator6197/videos Chief Michael Grizzle, Flagstaff Maroon Council, Trelawny Town, Jamaica Gaamang Gloria Simms, CEO of Maroon Indigenous Women's Circle, 1st Female Gaamang of the Maroons of Jamaica and Suriname Mr. Victor Barber-Richards, Representative of St. John's Maroon Church in Freetown, Sierra Leone Ing. Melbourne Garber, Historian & Engineer Organized by Adrian Q. Labor & Akindele T.M. Decker of African Curator, Barbara Morgan of Zion 230, Adesina During of KDU-Global, in partnership with the Freetown City Council.

Historic Freetown - One Journey symposium highlights (March 2022)

A virtual 'One Journey' symposium held on March 10, 2022 was the first in a series and featured speakers in Sierra Leone, Maryland, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Nova Scotia and other locations. They present perspectives, contributions and legacies of black Settlers around the world, and reflect on the founding of historic Freetown in 1792 and journeys beyond. https://m.youtube.com/@africancurator6197/videos This session's topics include West Africa before the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, differences between history and heritage; Black Loyalists who fought during the American Revolutionary War and later settled in Canada, the largest exodus of free blacks from the Americas to Africa; the Gullah-Geechee Corridor, Black Seminole stories; #1792 initiatives including the Book of Letters and Proclamation projects; Liberated Africans and diasporas within Africa; the Krios, Islam and Freetown with all its Identities, 230 years on. Organized by Adrian Q. Labor & Akindele T.M. Decker of African Curator, Amadu Massally & Aminata Kondeh of TPISENT, Barbara Morgan of Zion 230, Adesina During of KDU-Global, in partnership with the Freetown City Council and the Mayor of Freetown.  Visit https://youtu.be/it6VDkgCYFI [https://youtu.be/it6VDkgCYFI] for highlights of 'Freetown At 230 Years Anniversary Celebrations - 7th to 13th March 2022' (FCC).

Historic Freetown - Cotton Tree stories

Freetown's Cotton Tree was the south-west demarcation of the city when its earliest plans were drawn up. It stood at the junction of trails, one of which led to Pademba’s Village, where the town’s children were taken to seek refuge from the French invasion in which they burnt the town in February 1794. The Cotton Tree has a place in many significant cultural events and so many traditional beliefs by the seventeen nations that called Freetown home.  In particular, it is integral to the story of the early founding settlers, the Black Poor, Nova Scotian, Jamaican Maroons, Emigrated American and Caribbean Families. The founding settlers all gave significance to Cotton Tree as it stood majestically within their neighborhoods or within sight for the first decade since 1792. After the fall of the Cotton Tree on a stormy night in May 2023, Sierra Leoneans are telling its stories infused with social history and  traditional myths, it is how folktales are birthed.  The Cotton Tree took its last stand on that night, burdened by the nation’s unsettled past, its current political and economic storms, and weary of the prevailing winds of tumultuous attitudes. - Adrian Q. Labor Voiced by Akindele T. M. Decker Music: Sierra Leonean artist NATA (Raps Sweetheart) Nata - Art Thou (2021) [https://youtu.be/hL26ATRRAOE] Created by Barbara Morgan