Crafting Freedom: African-American Entrepreneurs in the Antebellum South

FAIN: BH-250757-16

Apprend Foundation (Durham, NC 27713-2219)
Laurel Sneed (Project Director: February 2016 to May 2024)

Two one-week workshops for seventy-two schoolteachers on African-American entrepreneurship in the antebellum South, exemplified by Thomas Day and Elizabeth Keckly.

The Apprend Foundation, Inc. of Research Triangle Park, North Carolina proposes offering "Crafting Freedom 2017: African American Entrepreneurs in the Antebellum South," a Landmarks of American History and Culture Workshop, in collaboration with five North Carolina historic sites: the Burwell School in Hillsborough; the Union Tavern and Milton Presbyterian Church in Milton; Stagville Plantation in Durham; and the Wilson Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. "Crafting Freedom" engages K–12 educators in the theme of African-American agency by exploring the art and craft production, actions of resistance, and the literary works of a dozen little known yet historically significant Southern African Americans. Free black cabinetmaker Thomas Day (1801–ca. 1861) and formerly enslaved dressmaker–turned–Lincoln White House–insider Elizabeth Keckly (1817–1907) are the major black entrepreneurs featured in the workshop and at three of the five sites.