The Greenwich Historical Society, in partnership with the League of Women Voters of Greenwich, invites you to our local transcribe-a-thon as part of a nationwide celebration of Douglass Day, marking the birth of Frederick Douglass. The day will include activities such as transcribing documents and various speakers on Frederick Douglass. For those unable to attend, the event will be live streamed and you can enjoy the curated Spotify playlist!
Douglass Day is an annual program organized by The Center for Black Digital Research in which thousands of people gather to help create new and freely available resources for learning about Black history. A different collection of Black history is featured each year, and the Douglass Day transcribe-a-thon helps create new digital resources for African American history. All materials created are made free and open to all.
Douglass Day 2024 will feature the general correspondence of Frederick Douglass from the Library of Congress. We will attempt to transcribe all 8,731 pages in one day! The entire collection includes approximately 7,400 digitized items (38,000 images). The material dates range from 1841-1964 and most of the materials are from 1862-1895. You can find Douglass’s diary, family papers, correspondence, newspaper clippings, handwritten partial draft of The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass, speeches and articles, and more!
Douglass Day 2024 will focus on his “General Correspondence, 1841-1912.” The correspondence includes letters from and about Douglass to family members, activists, politicians, and organizations before and after his death in 1895.
Douglass Day is made possible by a large number of partners and supporters. They include: The Center for Black Digital Research at Penn State, the Colored Conventions Project, the Anna Julia Cooper Digital Project, the Moorland-Spingarn Research Center at Howard University, the Princeton University Center for Digital Humanities, the PSU Libraries, the PSU Center for Humanities and Information, and the PSU College of Liberal Arts, the American Studies Association for a Community Partnership Grant, and By The People at the Library of Congress.
View past Douglass Day events for an idea of this years celebration!
Douglass Day Schedule
Live broadcast – 12:00 to 12:30pm
- Sing “Lift Every Voice and Sing”
- Overview for the Douglass Day program
- Speakers on Douglass
- A dramatic reading of “Why Hold a Colored Convention?” by Hassan El-Amin & introductions
Activity – 12:30 to 1:00pm– Time for transcribing
Live broadcast – 1:00 to 1:30pm
- Sing “Happy birthday”
- A dramatic reading of “Why Hold a Colored Convention?” by Hassan El-Amin & introductions
Activity – 1:30 to 2:00pm – Time for transcribing
Live broadcast – 2:00 to 2:20pm
Activity – 2:20 to 2:45pm – Time for transcribing
Live broadcast – 2:45 to 3:00pm
Highlights from social media
Bake Off Prizes
Closing Reflections
