At 2 pm Saturday, August 6th tower bells will ring thirteen times in Peterboro NY to commemorate the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery, and to call all interested persons together to celebrate the 100th birthday of the National Park Service. The Gerrit Smith Estate is a part of the National Park Service (NPS) as a National Historic Landmark (NHL) and as a site on the Network to Freedom (NTF) which is the national Underground Railroad Trail. In celebration of the Centennial, the Park Service has issued an NTF Passport Stamp to 75 sites in the nation and 7 sites in this state to mark the NPS Centennial Passport. The Gerrit Smith Estate National Historic Landmark is proud to be one of these sites and will present the stamp during the program in The Barn. Libby Miller (aka Jody Luce) will be on duty in her father’s 1804 Land Office to stamp passports after the program.
The audience will gather in the 210-year-old carriage barn for the two o’clock program. The Barn was one part of the Underground Railroad operation at the Smith home. From here hundreds of fugitive slaves were transported to Smith’s agent in Oswego to help the freedom seekers safely cross Lake Ontario to freedom. Rick Bargabos, Supervisor Town of Smithfield, and Nell Ziegler, President of the Smithfield Community Association, will welcome guests. The 157th New York Infantry Regiment (reenacting) will present the colors of 35 stars. Rev. Jermain Wesley Loguen of Syracuse (aka Djed Snead) will offer an opening 19th Century prayer and words about Smith, Loguen’s good friend and Underground Railroad colleague. O Freedom, the first musical selection will be performed by Max Smith. After remarks by abolition scholars Norman K. Dann PhD and Hugh Humphreys, Matt Urtz (Madison County Historian) and Kevin Coffee (Executive Director of the Oneida Community Mansion House) will connect local information to the event. Cordell Reaves (NYS Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation) will explain the designations of the Gerrit Smith Estate. Assemblyman Bill Magee will read the NYS Legislative Proclamations honoring the day. The six other NYS NPS sites will be recognized and U.S. Senator Gillibrand’s office will represent the national origin of the passport stamp presented to the GSENHL. Rev. Jim Fletcher, pastor for the Perryville and Peterboro United Methodist Churches, will offer his 2013 Prayer of Reconciliation at the conclusion of the National Park Service Centennial Celebration.
Tours of the Gerrit Smith Estate National Historic Landmark will be conducted at 3 pm. At 4 p.m. refreshments will be served at the Smithfield Community Center, the building where the abolitionists of the state held the inaugural meeting of the New York State Antislavery Society in 1835. The National Abolition Hall of Fame and Museum will be open to visitors to see a facsimile of the Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, once owned by Gerrit Smith.
At 2 p.m. on Sunday, August 7, 2016 a Community Conversation for all interested persons will be held in The Barn to carry the work of Gerrit Smith to the 21st Century. Drea Finley will be the lead facilitator of the We’ve Always Been Here: LGBTQ Identities, Race and the Power of Community. Finley is a member of the Cabinet of Freedom for the National Abolition Hall of Fame and Museum and is co-chair of its Cultural Diversity Committee. In her working life, Finley serves as an Assistant Dean for Administrative Advising and Director of First Generation Programs at Colgate University. Finley is also a Masters student at Syracuse University in the Higher Education Cultural Foundations Program. As an activist; she writes and speaks often on race and racism and their intersections with other identities and systems of oppression.
The public is encouraged to join descendants of freedom seekers who came to Peterboro for the free weekend. For updates and more information: www.gerritsmith.org, info@gerritsmith.org, or 315-280-8828.