Death, Tech, & Afrofuturism: Juneteenth Harrisburg Join us for a compelling journey through time as Rachael Keri Williams, founder and Executive Director of SOAL: Saving Our Ancestors’ Legacy, delivers an inspiring talk titled “Death, Tech, & Afrofuturism” in this video from the YPOC 2024 Juneteenth Harrisburg Summit, held on June 18th at … Continue reading →
Black History is not Lost it’s just Buried | SOAL Hoodie Support the Black Cemetery movement! Support saving your ancestors’ legacy. Support Saving Our Ancestors’ Legacy…And, get your own “Black History is not Lost it’s just Buried” Premium Eco SOAL Hoodie! Manny after the arrival of his hoodie! Showing support for the … Continue reading →
I am a Descendant Reclaiming Black History in the Whitest State in America “We want to rename a building at UMaine for your grandmother!” Beryl Warner Williams Hall It’s been 2 years since I accepted that challenge… And I’m not sure that anyone at the University knew what they were getting into … Continue reading →
Special Guest Cemetery Restoration Workshop at Lincoln Cemetery SOAL is co-hosting a SPECIAL GUEST Cemetery Restoration Workshop at Lincoln Cemetery! This is a great opportunity for those of you in the South Central PA region and beyond!!! Marc Ormerod, of Monument Preservation & Restoration (based in Connecticut), will be coming out to … Continue reading →
Never know what you’re gonna find in a graveyard till you dig it up!!! #radicalhistoryreclamation Never know what you’re gonna find in a graveyard till you dig it up!!! I don’t always find headstones…But, finding sunken headstones is one of my favorite parts of #radicalhistoryreclamation! If I’ve learned anything in this process, … Continue reading →
Rachael & Bhakti visiting their ancestors’ home, and Underground Railroad site, on Yellow Hill in Adams County, before their visit to Lincoln Cemetery in Harrisburg. (Edward Mathews and Francis Gantt purchased 17 acres for their family, a church, and a cemetery in the early 1840s…Only the house, barn, & pond remain visible).
Continue reading →Radical History Reclamation Demo: Black Family History Needs Light Everyday I learn a little more about all of the things we can’t see without light… This is especially true when it comes to history. Everything that has been shut away in forgotten drawers, missed in dismal attic corners, and especially those things … Continue reading →
This is my Endgame. It’s time to gather ancestors… At SOAL we are saving our ancestors legacy. We will do it bone by bone if we have to. We’re gonna need them where we trying to go: We can’t have a future without a past. I’m not trying to leave anyone behind, … Continue reading →
SOAL’s Lincoln Cemetery Restoration Year 1 Video Montage Since finding human remains on the ground in June 2021 at Harrisburg’s oldest historically Black burial ground, Lincoln Cemetery, a small but growing cadre of volunteers have been dedicated to Saving Our Ancestors Legacy using best-practice least-harm historic preservation methods. We have recovered headstones … Continue reading →
Lincoln Cemetery Burial Records An example of two types of Harrisburg Lincoln Cemetery Burial Records that were digitized by SOAL: SavingOurAncestorsLegacy volunteers in 2021. Some of the other types include handwritten notebooks, family plot maps, record of payment, account ledgers, burial records compiled from funeral homes, and handwritten records of headstone inscriptions, … Continue reading →
