Read, Watch, Support for the 4th
Be human and stay cool.
Wow, this heat. Nothing could feel more appropriate for the 2026 edition of Independence Day. As you mull ways to commemorate without melting, take time to hydrate and enjoy this collection of stories and perspectives on the 250th. More to share next week.
Back to our roots
On June 26, the 17th annual Reading Frederick Douglass Together on Boston Common was moved to the African Meeting House at the Museum of African American History (MAAH) on Beacon Hill. This was the first time in my memory that we’d needed a rain location, but the move felt like an appropriate recommitment to Mass Humanities’ partnership with MAAH and Community Change. Wes DeShano interviewed the great Paula Elliot, who spoke to that history.
The Meeting House had a brush with disaster a few weeks back. With its two hundred year-old floorboards, AI version of Douglass, and a brilliant team led by Noelle Trent, MAAH deserves your support this year. Here’s how you can help them match a new $50,000 matching opportunity.
At the reading, Community Change executive director Shay Stewart Bouley spoke to the moment and reminded us of the efforts to intimidate activists who follow in Douglass’s footsteps. You can help by supporting Community Change.
We supported 76 Douglass Readings in 2026
I hope you’re getting ready for one today or tomorrow. Our thanks to Rep. Ayanna Pressley, who contributed a 77th by reading “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” on the floor of the House of Representative on Tuesday. Her remarks begin at 8:48:15.
We are grateful for her kind words for Mass Humanities at 8:41:13:
Before I begin, I want to recognize and thank Mass Humanities for sustaining this vital tradition through public readings of Douglass’s speech across Massachusetts, ensuring that its message continues to educate, challenge, and to inspire generations.
My recent writing:
I wrote about the Douglass movement for Commonwealth Beacon.
I wrote about Gil Scott-Heron’s recording in Boston, July 3+4, 1976 for the Boston Art Review.
Listen
I’ve always enjoyed Ben Franklin’s World, and really appreciated Liz Covart’s three-part series, “How the Revolution Happened,” examining the Lee Resolution, the Model Treaty, and the Articles of Confederation.
Watch
One thing I’ve learned the last few weeks: local TV news can get it right. Two stories we’re grateful for:
Thanks to Glenn Jones of NBC Boston for exploring the Douglass movement through a visit to Center for Law and Education and an interview with MH’s Latoya Bosworth. Watch it here.
Thanks to Levan Reid of CBS Boston for spending the morning at the Marblehead Museum and talking with MH’s Katherine Stevens.
Read
Former MH board member and legendary public historian Marty Blatt co-edited “The Other Legacy: A Counternarrative to Celebrating America 250” for the Southern Poverty Law Center. Contributors include MH board member and Royall House executive director Kyera Singleton.
Visit
On June 26, the Worcester Black History Project and the Nipmuc Indian Development Corp opened a new exhibit, “The Hidden Census: Using Data as Resistance to Visualize the Presence of Black and Nipmuc People During the Revolutionary Era in Central Massachusetts,” at the JMAC in Worcester. Congrats to MH board member Deborah Hall and 2024 Governor’s Award in the Humanities honoree Cheryl Toney Holley. Here’s a good interview in Worcester Magazine:
“(The American Revolution) didn't happen around Black and Nipmuc communities, it happened within them. We are just as much a part of the story as everyone else,” genealogist and historian Cheryl Toney Holley said. “When you open up your history books, you don't hear about people like us, but we were there too.”
The exhibit is up through August 2.
Invite to July 15 “Promises of the Revolution”
We invite you to join us at GBH on July 15 to celebrate the “Promises of the Revolution” film series. Huge thanks to my colleagues Raeshma Razvi and Wes DeShano for leading this partnership. The first film, “Mashpee Wampanoag: The Fight for Freedom That History Forgot,” directed by Steven Peters and Smoke Sygnals, is on GBH’s YouTube page now.
Hope to see you then.