Artist and photographer Clifford Oliver Mealy presents “From Slavery to Civil Rights: We Continue to Climb the Mountaintop” Monday, Jan. 15 from 5 to 6:30 p.m. in the Nott Memorial.
The event is part of the celebration marking the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Mealy, of Greenwich, N.Y., honors his heritage and ancestors by re-enacting stories and personages of well-known African Americans. He will re-enact the story of Solomon Northup of Saratoga Springs, who was kidnapped, sold into slavery and held captive for 12 years. Mealy will provide the campus community with a unique story-telling method and re-enactment of Northup's life as a free man and a slave and his treacherous escape and return to freedom.
Northup was born in Minerva, N.Y., in 1808. While working at local hotels as a cab driver and violinist in 1841, he was kidnapped from Saratoga Springs, leaving behind a wife and three children. He was held in a slave pen in Washington, D.C., and sold into slavery in Louisiana, where he served three masters.
Samuel Bass, a Canadian, and local citizens of Saratoga and surrounding areas were instrumental in arranging for Solomon's release and return to his family in January 1853. Solomon wrote an account of his experiences, Twelve Years a Slave (1853), and became involved in the abolitionist movement, lecturing on slavery in the northeastern United States.
In 1999, Clifford Brown, professor of political science, and Rachel Seligman, director of the Mandeville Gallery, created an exhibit honoring Northup in the Nott. That July, more than 30 descendants of Northup gathered for a family reunion on campus.
During Monday's program, Deidre Hill Butler, associate professor of sociology, will connect Northup's drive and determination for freedom and its relationship to the civil rights movement.
The program is sponsored by the Africana Studies Department, Student Activities, Kenney Community Center, Campus Ministry, AOP/HEOP Department and a host of student groups.