VA250 Program Series – We Demand: Student Activism and the Struggle for Racial Justice at the University of Virginia, 1966-Present

For the past decade, Claudrena Harold has combined historical research with creative practice to illuminate the beauty, richness, and complexity of Black life and student protest at the University of Virginia.

In this lecture, Harold will examine how student activists have transformed the intellectual, political, and social life of UVA and the broader Charlottesville community through their sustained efforts to define, implement, and defend their visions of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Her talk will explore several key questions, including: How, and to what extent, has student activism changed since the late 1960s and early 1970s? How have these transformations been shaped by broader political developments in higher education and U.S. race relations? What does the complex political, intellectual, and cultural life at UVA reveal about how race is lived and experiences in 21st-century America? How have current student activists responded to the challenges of a post-DEI landscape and volatile period of leadership transition?

 

VA250 Program Series – Roosevelt, Truman and the Fight for Freedom, Abroad and at Home

This lecture in the Fighting for Freedom Program Series will focus on why and how Presidents Roosevelt and Truman fought for freedom against the Axis powers during World War II and prepared for another struggle against Soviet communism in its aftermath. Professor Emeritus of American History at the University of Virginia Melvyn P. Leffler will share how the struggle was not simply about the fight for freedom abroad, but also at home.

VA250 Program Series – Women and the Fight for Inclusion: A Local to National Look

The May installation of the Fighting for Freedom Program Series will look at the ways in which women have fought for equality and inclusion throughout American history. This moderated panel discussion will look at the stories of local women – like Mary Carr Greer and Peachie Carr Jackson – who embodied a dedication to education; local movements – like the long fight for coeducation at the University of Virginia; and more national trends – like the continued work on the Equal Rights Amendment and women’s role in American politics.

Joining the panel will be Virginia District 4 Congresswoman Jennifer McClellan, Professor Emerita from the University of Virginia History Department Phyllis Leffler, and Director of Education at the Ivy Creek Foundation Chloe Fridley, who will all discuss ways that women’s fight for inclusion has shaped our local history and informs our national future. The discussion will be moderated by Catherine Allgor, President Emerita of the Massachusetts Historical Society

VA250 Program Series – The Price We Pay: Tax Policy and the Struggle for Equality in America

You can learn a lot about a society by how it raises and spends the public’s money. In this talk, UVA professor and award-winning historian Andrew Kahrl will tell the history of taxation in America and how it shaped larger struggles for freedom and equality in the nation’s past. He will show how America’s localized tax system evolved, how it works, who it has tended to work for, and how it made the America we live in today. And he will tell the story of those who fought for a fairer tax system in the past and the lessons of those struggles for understanding American politics today.

VA250 Program Series – Freedom & Liberty in the American Civil War

On November 19, 1863, President Lincoln consecrated the Union graves at Gettysburg in the name of a “new birth for freedom.” Even as enslaved peoploe and white Unionists waged a war in the name of freedom, so too did Confederates claim that theirs was a war of liberty. UVA History professor Caroline Janney will explore how the legacy of the American Revolution permeated the Civil War at the national, state, and local levels.

 

Historic Preservation Lecture Series – Preserving Black History in Rural Virginia

At the center of most 19th century Black communities were two critical institutions—a church and a school.  Beginning as modest, simple frame structures, later additions and improvements came as community size, wealth, and pride grew.

Since retiring five years ago as UVA’s Historic Preservation Architect, Jody Lahendro, FAIA, has provided professional services to central Virginia nonprofits seeking to preserve historic Black schools and churches.  In this talk, Jody will present several of his projects, from initial community engagement and grant assistance, through the architectural and construction process.  He will also discuss how these buildings fit within the broader cultural histories of Black education and religion.

 

VA250 Program Series – Enslaved Voices and the American Dream: What Were They Fighting For?

The ideals promised in the Declaration of Independence—life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—were not extended to all people at the time of their writing. Though enslaved people throughout the country were denied basic rights before and after the creation of the nation, this did not stop them from consistently working toward their own freedom and the freedom of their families. In this panel, hear from representatives of three local descendant organizations on what the “American Dream” meant to enslaved people in Charlottesville and Albemarle County. With a moderated discussion by Dr. Shelley Viola Murphy, Descendant Project Researcher at the Gibbons Project, this panel will feature Helice Henderson Jones (DEC-VA), Jennifer Saylor Stacy (Highland Council of Descendant Advisors), and Ty’Leik Chambers (Monticello’s Getting Word Project) as they discuss what motivated enslaved people to continue their fights for freedom.

 

ACHS Annual Program – Hamilton and Jefferson: Their Future and Our Past

Equally dedicated to the cause of American independence, Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson envisioned the new nation’s future in radically different ways. Hamilton scholar Joanne Freeman and Peter Onuf, her Jeffersonian counterpart, will explore the life experiences and worldviews of these great rivals in order to illuminate the complex and contested national narrative that emerged from an era of regime change and revolutionary upheaval. Justifying the break with Britain, mobilizing patriots in the continental common cause, and constituting new republican governments for the states and for the nation posed daunting and unprecedented challenges.

This lively discussion of history and ideas was moderated by Virginia Humanities Fellow and Faculty Director at the Summer Jefferson Symposium at UVA John Ragosta.