Newark Underground Railroad Remembrance Fundraiser

Commemorate Underground Railroad history by raising funds for local organizations and learning about Newark's Black Liberation Heritage!

Join us for International Underground Railroad Month in commemorating Newark's 200-year-old Black Liberation Heritage by supporting a food pantry for students, an emergency shelter for LGBTQ youth, and preserving the artwork and legacy of Newark Black artist and writer Jerry Gant who created powerful public work about freedom and community!

The Underground Railroad Movement was about saving the lives of yourself and others, teaching others about freedom and their rights, raising money and sheltering and feeding people in need.

This fundraiser commemorates the Underground Railroad and the Anti-Colonization movement in Newark by helping our present-day communities survive and thrive utilizing the tactics Black activists used then.

ABOUT

This fundraiser is created by historian and artist , Noelle Lorraine Williams, Black Power! 19th Century and done in conjunction with an educational art exhibition and read-inthat honors Newark’s earliest Black churches and community groups that fought slavery and the removal of Blacks from the United States by:

1) Raising money to help freedom seekers;

2) Feeding them, sheltering them here and abroad and;

3) Published their writings and hosted meetings to raise the consciousness of the people against slavery and the colonization movement.

FAQ

1) Where will the money go?

Proceeds will be split between:

1-RU-N Food Pantry

All Rutgers-Newark community members have access to the RU-N Pantry as a completely free resource for groceries, including dairy, grains, fresh produce, and more.

2- Essex County LGBT RAIN Foundation

The Essex LGBT Reaching Adolescents In Need / Foundation RAIN (Reaching Adolescents In Need).

A non-profit that provides emergency shelter services to address the emergent need of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and, Transgender (LGBT) youth experiencing crisis leading to homelessness.

3- Gartrell Gant Foundation for Cultural Guardianship

is a New Jersey based Black women-led that works to uplift the legacies and highlight the significant accomplishments of Black artists with a particular focus on those hailing from New Jersey who have passed away over the last 20 years.

4)Psst!

Don't get it twisted, American slavery was about blood and violence and in no way are we replicating it. We are replicating and honoring Black innovation, intellectualism, community and, resilience - right here in Newark and across the country!

Background

What we now call the “Underground Railroad” and the Anti-Colonization movement was a centuries-long Black liberation movement here in Newark and across the country to free enslaved Black people and assist them with creating powerful and violence-free lives in the United States. Many major Underground Railroad and Anti-Colonization leaders like Frederick Douglass who visited Plane Street Colored Church on the newly renamed Frederick Douglass Field, Samuel Cornish and Christopher Ruush lived, worked or spoke here.

Learn more about Newark's Black Liberation Heritage

In 1834 The Colored Anti-Slavery Society was founded. Four years later Black Underground Railroad leader and co-editor of the first national Black newspaper Samuel Cornish published a 26-page most powerful pamphlet against the proposed removal of Black people to Liberia called *The Colonization Scheme Considered: In Its Rejection by the Colored People... here in Newark.