The Preserving Black Haddonfield History Project kicks off semiquincentennial celebrations

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With the country nearing its semiquincentennial milestone, the Preserving Black Haddonfield History Project is kicking off celebrations Monday with its American Revolution in Black & White series.

The event will feature Georgetown University professor Maurice Jackson, who specializes in 17th and 18th century history centered around abolition.

“I spent a year studying Quaker abolitionists and there are certain points about them that still are resonant today,” Jackson said.

Jackson said the Quaker values of fighting for peace and money being used as a tool and not an end goal are still relevant.

“I want to look at a central question of the ideas of the American Revolution and why some were achieved and why some not achieved,” he said.

Jackson’s talk will focus on “Slavery, Abolition and the American Revolution: Debates Rooted in Economics, Faith, Human Rights and Foreign Policies,” and will be held at 6:30 p.m. at the Society of Friends Meeting House in Haddonfield.

The event is presented by the new Coalition on Slavery, Abolition and the American Revolution that also includes Haddonfield Friends, the Historical Society of Haddonfield, Indian King Tavern and Museum and the Lawnside Historical Society.

Adrienne Rhodes, co-founder of the Preserving Black Haddonfield History Project, said they are “fortunate to have joined forces with other institutions which share this perspective.”

“Our goal is to provide a broad view of the dynamics at-play in this region at the time of the American Revolution,” said Rhodes, who is also a member of WHYY’s Community Advisory Board.

Area scholars said the topic is timely and that these conversations about the nation’s past are an important reminder leading up to the 250th celebrations.

Leigh-Anne Francis, professor of African American studies and women’s gender and sexuality studies at The College of New Jersey, described the principles of the American Revolution  as “perfect … beautiful and admirable.”

“We should pursue the actualization of these ideals,” she said. “But in application or when they were talked about … the principles were used to pursue white supremacist goals.”

Jack O’Byrne, executive director of the Camden County Historical Society, pointed out that the Declaration of Independence proclaims “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”

O’Byrne said “that was certainly not the case back then.”

“What they thought of equal men were … white men that owned property,” he said. “This was only probably about 3% of the population. Clearly we have made progress, but we haven’t made the promised land yet.”

O’Byrne and Francis said that for all of the times the country has moved forward towards the idea of all men being created equal, there has been a regression away from that mark.

“For many who thought it was the end of history and that we had reached a pinnacle when Barack Obama got elected [president] and perhaps that was the end of racism,” O’Byrne said. “But obviously now here in 2025, we know there’s been a severe backlash and now there’s the rapid erosion of rights and almost the elimination of Black and anyone else’s history.”

“The backslide … [is] so drastic,” Francis said about current times. “I’m not sure there’s ever been a backslide, a backlash, this dramatic.”

It is critical to remember the history of the country

Francis said recent moves by the Trump administration to reshape American history is an attack on the nation’s “ability to dream and envision a free world.”

“If they succeed in that, it’s like we have nothing,” she said. “That’s where we find hope. We find a roadmap to creating new futures.”

O’Byrne said it is important to tell “the whole story of the struggle for equality that was promised in the Declaration of Independence.” He takes his cue from documentary filmmaker Ken Burns, who shared his response to those who criticize him for “being too woke.”

“[Burns’] saying, ‘I’m just calling balls and strikes,’ these are the facts that have presented themselves and to deny that things actually happened … that’s not doing history any service or doing the American people any service,” O’Byrne said.