Black History

Three prominent African American musicians from the Bloomington-Normal area spoke Saturday at a panel at the McLean County Museum of History.

Co-professors Eric Wesselmann and Stanford Carpenter's honors seminar on Black horror films was well-received by students and the public. The Normal Theater pressed them to mix up a new course focused on 1970s blaxploitation films.

Scholars Stanford Carpenter and Eric Wesselmann co-teach a course on horror films with Black protagonists, villains and anti-heroes. Carpenter helped coin the term EthnoGothic to capture how different people respond to horror based on race, culture and social identity.

WGLT's McHistory series features Richard Blue, the first Black person to run for council in Bloomington. He was also a Civil War veteran, activist, member of a literary society, doorman at the state capital, and barber.

The community celebrated Juneteenth on Saturday at Miller Park. The event was hosted by the Bloomington-Normal Black History Project in partnership with the City of Bloomington.

Bloomington Mayor Mboka Mwilambwe said he has a big vision for the annual Juneteenth celebration at Miller Park, emphasizing that marking the end of slavery is important for the entire community.

Juneteenth has been celebrated in Bloomington off and on for 30 years. Last year's move to Miller Park came with a boost of city support. The 2023 Juneteenth promises to be bigger than ever, with V.I.P. the Little Mermaid making an appearance.

In a rare Bloomington performance at Illinois Wesleyan University on Saturday, the Baroque Artists of Champaign-Urbana share music by Bonds, Burleigh and Boulanger.

Some of Bloomington’s brightest young minds are featured in this year’s group of Black History Essay Contest winners for 2023.

The McLean County Museum of History and Not In Our Town partnered to create an interactive website based on their long-running Social Justice Walking Tour. The D-I-Y tour includes locations pivotal to various social movements related to gender and racial equality, immigrant rights and organized labor.