A traveling museum that spotlights African American history across generations is making a pit stop in Charleston next week for a two-day exhibition hosted by West Virginia State University (WVSU).
On March 9 and 10, the WVSU Center in Charleston will be filled with artifacts, informational displays and live presentations from the Sankofa African-American Museum on Wheels.
Since 1995, the mobile museum has traveled the United States to share glimpses into Black history in the United States, from the antebellum era to the Civil Rights Movement to the contemporary moment.
The free-to-attend exhibition is cosponsored by WVSU, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of West Virginia, the Black Voter Impact Initiative (BVII) and the West Virginia-based Black By God newsroom.
Shanequa Smith is an organizer for the BVII, a West Virginia community organization that aims to “embrace, educate and empower Black people to vote,” according to its Facebook page. Smith said she was inspired to invite the museum to Charleston after seeing its exhibition in Charleston several years ago.
“It was just more than a museum. It was an experience,” she said.
Smith said she began contacting community partners about the possibility of bringing the exhibit to Charleston. Her organization often hosts community events and youth programming, but a museum exhibition was relatively new territory for them, she said.
“It’s important for us to learn our history and how we got here,” she said. “Many times when we hear history, we hear it from the media, which maybe only tells our history from one perspective. But I think the museum brings a joy to our history, which a lot of times is not told.”
Now in its thirtieth year, the Sankofa African-American Museum on Wheels will visit Charleston for a free exhibit March 9 and 10.
Photo Credit: Sphinx Media
The exhibition also coincides with West Virginia’s fourth annual Black Policy Day, an annual lobbying event that aims to highlight issues impacting Black West Virginians and urge lawmakers to address them. The campaign is led by the BVII.
“In the past, they have brought hundreds of community members and students into the Capitol to talk about a whole variety of issues, particularly issues that impact Black communities here in West Virginia,” said Eli Baumwell, executive director of the ACLU of West Virginia.
Baumwell said the ACLU has helped sponsor museum exhibitions in the past, and saw hosting the Sankofa Museum as urgent for the current political climate.
“We wanted to do this particularly right now, when there’s this backlash and this attempt to censor American history, particularly Black history,” Baumwell said. “To treat it as somehow divisive, rather than an important part of understanding where we are and how we got here.”
Sergio Rodriguez is director of the WVSU Center, a university event space in downtown Charleston. He said the center was created roughly one year ago, and sees exhibitions like the Sankofa Museum as an opportunity to open the space — and the university’s educational programming — to the wider West Virginia community.
West Virginia State has “all these kinds of activities at the center so we can partner with the community, we can engage with the community,” Rodriguez said. “The center is working hard to get all these projects coming to the center.”
The March exhibition marks the museum’s first visit to Charleston, and Rodriguez said West Virginia State is eager to bring it to new audiences.
“We are excited because this museum is going to be 30 years old this year, and has been in 40 states,” Rodriguez said. “We want to highlight African American history… and I think this is a good way to promote history.”
The exhibition is open to the public and free to attend. It can be accessed at the WVSU Center in Charleston at 107 Capitol St. on Sunday, March 9 from 1 to 6 p.m., and on Monday, March 10 from 1 to 7 p.m.
