<div class="gmail_quote"><div vlink="purple" link="blue" lang="EN-US"><div dir="ltr" align="left" lang="en-us"><font size="2" face="Tahoma">Don't miss this wonderful opportunity to look in on Frederick Douglass "live" and in Spartanburg! For only $10 a seat, you can enjoy this wonderful performance as well as a brief presentation of the Community Weavers of 2009. Proceeds support the Regional Museum of History, one of the historic resources of the Spartanburg County Historical Association.<br>
<br>Let me know if you have questions!<br><br></font>Becky Slayton<br>Acting Executive Director, 864-278-9664<br>Administrator, Walnut Grove Plantation & Price House, 864-576-6546<br><br></div>
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<div dir="ltr" align="left"><font size="6"><span style="font-size: 28pt; font-style: italic; font-family: 'Adobe Caslon Pro';">In
The Shadow of Slavery<br></span></font><font size="4" face="Adobe Caslon Pro"><span style="font-weight: bold; font-size: 14pt; font-style: italic; font-family: 'Adobe Caslon Pro';"><font size="4">Mel Johnson Portrays F<span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"><font size="4" color="#000000" face="Times New Roman">r</font></font></span>ederick Douglass in One-Man Show</font><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"> </font></span></span></font></div>
<span style="font-family: 'Adobe Caslon Pro';"><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"></font><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"></font>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial">(see attachments) </font></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span></span><br><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"><font size="3" color="#000000" face="Times New Roman"><b>Date &
time:</b> Thursday, February 19 at 6:00 pm</font></font></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"><font size="3" color="#000000" face="Times New Roman"><b></b></font></font></span> </div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"><font size="3" color="#000000" face="Times New Roman"><b>Where:</b> David Reid Theater, Chapman Cultural Center, 200
East St. John Street, Spartanburg, SC 29306</font></font></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span><b></b></span> </div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><b>Tickets</b><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"><b><font size="3" color="#000000" face="Times New Roman">:</font></b> </font></span><b>$10 each </b><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"> <b><font size="3" color="#000000" face="Times New Roman">-
May</font></b> </font></span><b>be purchased by calling
542-ARTS or visit the Chapman Cultural Center Box Office.</b><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"><br></font></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"></font></span> </div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span><b>Sponsored by the
Spartanburg County Historical Association (SCHA). All proceeds
will go to support the SCHA.</b></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span><b></b></span> </div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span><span style="font-style: italic;">The Shadow of Slavery</span> was written by
actor/director Tom Dugan, who will also be in Spartanburg for this performance. His credits
include acting in <i><span style="font-style: italic;">Ghostbusters
II</span></i>, <i><span style="font-style: italic;">Kindergarten Cop</span></i>
and <i><span style="font-style: italic;">Beethoven II</span></i> and playwriting
<i><span style="font-style: italic;">Robert E. Lee—Shades of Gray</span></i> and
<i><span style="font-style: italic;">Confessions of a
Swordfish</span></i>.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"></font></span> </div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span><b><u>About
F</u></b><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff" face="Arial"><b><u><font size="3" color="#000000" face="Times New Roman">r</font></u></b></font></span><b><u>ederick
Douglass</u></b></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left">Before Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, there was
F<span>r</span>ederick Douglass, a slave who spoke up
for freedom and eloquently set the course of civil rights in America. His
story will be told Thursday, Feb. 19, by Broadway star Mel Johnson Jr. in a
one-man play presented at the Chapman Cultural Center.<br><br><i><span style="font-style: italic;">In The Shadow of Slavery</span></i> will be presented
by the Spartanburg County Historical Association in honor of Black History
Month. In addition to the one-and-a-half-hour-long performance of storytelling
and song, the recipients of the annual Spartanburg Community Weavers awards will
be announced. Community Weavers are African American citizens who are recognized
for "weaving the tapestry of the community with their spirit, vision and
leadership."<br><span><font size="2" color="#0000ff"> </font></span></div></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><span style="font-family: 'Adobe Caslon Pro';"><span> </span>"It will be a wonderful evening," Nannie
Jefferies, the Regional History Museum Administrator, said. "We are so very
lucky to have been able to book this performance, especially with an actor of
Mel Johnson's caliber. The play is right in line with our celebration of Black
History Month, telling a story that everyone needs to hear. It will be most
entertaining, as well as educational. Also, we'll start the evening with the
Spartanburg Community Weavers awards. These are citizens who have led by example
and who need to be recognized as leaders in our community. With both the
performance and the awards, this will be an historic evening to
remember."<br><br>In addition to presenting <i><span style="font-style: italic;">In The Shadow of Slavery</span></i> and the
Spartanburg Community Weavers awards, the Historical Association will honor
Black History Month with a special exhibit in the Regional History Museum at the Chapman Cultural Center. <i><span style="font-style: italic;">Powerful Expressions, Changing Lives</span></i> will
run Feb. 3-28 and will focus on great national orators and the powerful words
they spoke, words that inspired and changed people's lives. Also to be featured
in this exhibit will be the Community Weavers. The exhibit will be open Tuesday
through Saturday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. It is free to individual patrons.<br><br>As a
historical figure, Douglass established himself early in life as a man of
inspiring words. At the age of 23, he stood before a group of abolitionists—the
annual Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Convention—and told his life story of being
born a slave. His words were so stirring and eloquent he eventually became
internationally sought after as a lecturer on equal rights.<br><br>Born in
February 1818 on Maryland's eastern shore,
Frederick
Augustus Washington Bailey was the son of a black slave woman and a white man he
never knew. His early childhood was spent with his grandparents, having only
seen his mother four or five times before her death and his seventh birthday.
During these early years, Douglass (a last name he later assumed), was exposed
to all the degradations of slavery, including whippings, cold and
hunger.<br><br>At 8-years-old, Douglass was sent to live in Baltimore and with a ship
carpenter named Hugh Auld. It was during this time, he first heard the word
"abolition." This was also when he learned to read. Douglass spent seven
relatively comfortable years in Baltimore… that "laid the foundation and opened
the gateway to all my subsequent prosperity," he later said.<br><br>However, as
a young man, Douglass was sent back to the country, where he was hired out to a
farm run by a notoriously brutal slavebreaker named Edward Covey. Whipped daily
and starved, Douglass was soon "broken in body, soul and spirit."<br><br>In
1838, after two years of planning, Douglass finally made his escape and his way
to New York
City. Soon thereafter, he married, changed his named and
settled in New Bedford,
MA. Always striving to improve
himself, Douglass joined various organizations and began attending
abolitionists' meetings. It was through these activities that he made contact
with William Lloyd Garrison and his weekly journal, <i><span style="font-style: italic;">The Liberator</span></i>. Each man impressed the
other and soon a strong bond was forged in the name of freedom.<br><br>It was
through his association with Garrision that Douglass began his career as a
lecturer for the Anti-Slavery Society. "Flinty hearts were pierced, and cold
ones melted by his eloquence," is how one correspondent described Douglass's
speeches. Throughout the rest of Douglass's life, he toured the world speaking
out against slavery. Eventually, he published his own life story and his own
weekly newsletter, the <i><span style="font-style: italic;">North
Star</span></i>.<br><br> Known as the "Father of the Civil Rights
Movement," Douglass advised Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War and recruited
northern Blacks for the Union Army. After the war, he added the rights of women
to his agenda.<br><br>"F<span>r</span>ederick Douglass
had a very interesting life," Jefferies said. "His place in history is solid.
But this show is also entertaining and inspiring. Since it opened in 2006, it
has played all over the country to great
reviews."<br></span></div>
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