june 2025 Edition
Alexandria City High School
Remembrance Student Club
Are Alexandria’s kids brave enough to learn the history others want to erase? That is the question we plan to pose to Alexandria City High School students in September when we invite them to participate in this school year’s Remembrance Student Club.
The Remembrance Club developed out of the ACRP pilgrimage to Montgomery, Ala. in 2022, will expose students to Alexandria’s rich African American history through a series of field trips and culminates with a student showcase where scholarships will be awarded. This summer, ACRP hopes to raise $7,000 to support this club and make this program a reality.
The mission of the Remembrance Student Club is twofold. First, to deepen our young people’s understanding of our local shared history - from enslavement to civil rights activism in Alexandria. Second, to ensure young people feel empowered and are provided opportunities to become leaders in social justice, public history, and community advocacy.
When the Remembrance Student Club was developed in 2022, students worked on the Remembrances of Joseph McCoy, Benjamin Thomas, and the soil collection that year. They then went on the ACRP pilgrimage to EJI. As a follow up to the pilgrimage, students had the opportunity to participate in the Equal Justice Initiative essay contest. Now, we want to help students connect with Alexandria’s local history. This fall ACRP will launch the “Banned Truth Tour of Alexandria!”
Students who choose to accept the challenge and join the club will learn about this city’s role as the epicenter of the domestic slave trade; they will find out what Free Alexandria was like during the Civil War (as opposed to Occupied Alexandria); they will come to know about the first Civil Rights protest by Black soldiers; they will learn about the local fight for social and political rights during reconstruction, as well as in Jim Crow’s Alexandria; they will also hear about the Black community’s long struggle for a high school followed by their efforts to integrate the schools. This history will be distilled into three field trips taken during the school year. Students will be asked to choose a topic, issue, or a person they learned about during these trips and create a project (anything goes: performance, essay, paper, exhibit, website, documentary, poetry) for a Showcase Competition that will be held in the Spring of 2026. The projects will be judged and three students will win modest scholarships to be used to further their studies.
To learn more about the “Banned Truth Tour of Alexandria” and support the Remembrance Students, click here!
Remembrance of Benjamin Thomas Aug. 8, 2025 at 6:30 p.m.
Please join us on Friday, Aug. 8 at Shiloh Baptist Church at 6:30 p.m. to honor and remember Benjamin Thomas. The keynote speaker for this year’s Thomas Remembrance will be Dr. Steven Hahn, winner of the Pulitzer Prize in History. Dr. Hahn will speak about this Nation’s long relationship with political violence, racial terror, and the perpetual struggle to fulfill the promise of democracy made in the Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution, and the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments.
Shiloh Baptist Church was where Benjamin Thomas was baptized just two years before he was lynched. Shiloh Baptist Church was also the site of his Memorial Service that drew more than 600 African Americans from Alexandria and Washington who came to protest the racial violence wielded against their community.
Doors open at 6:15, the program begins at 6:30, and will be followed by a book signing. Hahn’s most recent book, Illiberal America A History, and his seminal work, for which he won the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for History, A Nation Under Our Feet, Black Political Struggles in the Rural South from Slavery to the Great Migration will be available for purchase. Don’t miss this opportunity to hear one of America’s leading experts on 19th-century history and greatest thinkers on current issues while also, crucially engaging in our memory culture by remembering the lynching of Benjamin Thomas to ensure such acts of political violence and racial terror do not happen again.
In The News
ACRP Faith Initiative Makes Public Statement
On Saturday, June 14, Rev. Professor Quardricos Driskell of Beulah Baptist Church delivered an open letter to Mayor Alyia Gaskins and Alexandria City Council members at their monthly meeting. The letter included a statement signed by nearly 28 clergy from across the city that recognizes those Alexandrians who are struggling and need support.
Rev. Driskell has been a member of ACRP’s Steering Committee since 2019 and co-chairs the ACRP Faith Initiative with Rev. Grace Han of Trinity United Methodist Church. Clergy have been meeting regularly and developed an Affirmation Statement to be shared with the citizens of Alexandria to provide support, empathy, and compassion.
The Faith Initiative grew out of the Alexandria Community Remembrance Project’s September 2022 soil collection ceremony for Joseph McCoy and Benjamin Thomas. Clergy from historically Black and white churches came together to read the Black National Anthem and lead Alexandrians in the collection of soil representing the lives of McCoy and Thomas. These churches are the nexus of ACRP’s growing Faith Initiative.
Last year, the Faith Initiative hosted a series of discussions on challenging topics titled "Courageous Conversations.” The group continues to bring faith leaders together to encourage cross-community and cross-faith dialogue and work.
Rev. Dr. Shelly Wood, pastor at Old Town Presbyterian Meeting House, helped draft the statement and said, “We decided that in this anxious time in our nation’s history, our statement could bring hope to our community as a whole. We want those who live and work here to know they are not alone.”
Right now, in this city, there are public servants waiting to hear if they will lose their jobs, who are watching all they worked for dismantled, and others are afraid they will be separated from their families due to the loss of due process of law. Some people, who are trying to live their truth, feel threatened for doing so, according to Rev. Wood. “We want them to know that they are seen, heard, advocated for and prayed for,” she added.
Rev. Driskell agreed, explaining that “Anger, grief, and frustration are not just understandable—they are righteous responses to a moment as fractured as ours. But if we’re not careful, they can harden into enmity. That’s why now, more than ever, we must meet people in their pain, not with platitudes but with presence. Those who are struggling, afraid, or disillusioned need to know: the clergy who signed that affirmation are not distant voices. We are here. We stand with you. Because what we are living through is not merely division—it is injustice, it is cruelty, and history will not judge it kindly.”
The open letter to the Mayor and City Council and the Faith Leader’s Affirmation Statement are available on the website of Trinity United Methodist Church.
Governor Vetoes Bills
This past April, the Virginia General Assembly convened to consider the Governor's proposed amendments and vetoes of legislation passed during the 2025 session. Three items being tracked by ACRP were vetoed by the Governor:
- A bill that would have repealed a special tax exemption for the United Daughters of the Confederacy and similar organizations.
- A bill that would have allowed high school students to use an African American History course for their Virginia and U.S. History graduation requirement.
- A bill that would have enhanced the education state prisoners receive by requiring evidence-based literacy instruction, data sharing, and reporting on participation. It also would have established a task force to standardize education across correctional facilities.
Seeking Applications for Volunteer Researchers
ACRP is looking for people who like to research to join our Committee of Inquiry. We will be focused on what happened in Alexandria from the end of the Civil War to the passage of the 1902 Virginia Constitution. Researchers with backgrounds in African American History, 19th Century politics, courts and human rights are preferred, but anyone with a keen interest should consider applying. Applicants must attend a virtual info session in the fall to be eligible for selection. The bulk of the research will be done from January 2026 through the end of June 2026.
Upcoming Events
Public Hearing: Supreme Court of Virginia: Access to Justice In Alexandria
Tues. June 24
4:30-6:30 p.m.
Alexandria Library Duncan Branch (Del Ray), 2501 Commonwealth Avenue
Virginia’s Access to Justice Commission would like to hear from the public about their experiences with the justice system. Has it been difficult to find legal help for yourself, your family, or your business? What happened when you couldn’t find legal help when you needed it? Have you had challenges using or appearing in Virginia courts? Have you required translation help with legal matters? What are your experiences with the forms required for legal assistance and lawsuits? Do you have ideas for how to make legal help more available in your community? There will be pizza and refreshments available to all who attend.
Benjamin Thomas Remembrance Event
Fri. Aug. 8
Doors open at 6:15, Program begins at 6:30, Book signing at 7:30.
Shiloh Baptist Church,1401 Jamieson Street (new building not the historic one)
Free
Don’t miss the chance to hear Pulitzer Prize Winning Historian Steven Hahn speak in remembrance of Benjamin Thomas who was denied due process and lynched in Alexandria on Aug. 8, 1899. A book signing will follow the program.
Black Family Reunion
Sat. Sept. 6
11-3 p.m.
Alexandria Library Barrett Branch, 717 Queen Street
Free
It’s Back! Join your friends and neighbors at the next Black Family Reunion outside of Alexandria’s Barrett Branch Library and enjoy the food, music, and dancing. There will be opportunities to record memories and donate photographs and documents to the Special Collections archives. All are welcome!
Committee Meeting Reports
The Alexandria Community Remembrance Project Steering Committee met on June 11 and confirmed plans for the Benjamin Thomas Remembrance Event, reviewed and approved the new Remembrance Student program, and made plans for the fall Tables of Conscience series (focusing on banned books). The Committee reviewed a short video created by Mark Farkas to explain ACRP’s work and help fundraise for Remembrance Students, the Memorial Scholarship fund, and operational funding.
Alexandria Community Remembrance Project
The Alexandria Community Remembrance Project (ACRP) is a city-wide initiative dedicated to helping Alexandria understand its history of racial terror hate crimes and to work toward creating a welcoming community bound by equity and inclusion.
In Memoriam
Write "ACRP" in Comments on the donation form.
Office of Historic Alexandria
City of Alexandria, Virginia
ACRP@alexandriava.gov