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Western researchers recovering Black history in London, Ontario
Keri Ferguson, Western News
Black Londoners Project retraces lives of forgotten freedom seekers settling in city, restoring public memory of early Black presence, contributions
When Ronique Gillis walks the streets of London, Ont., she’s struck, not so much by what she sees, but by what’s invisible.
“When I wander downtown, I think about how some of these places once belonged to Black Londoners as Black businesses or households,” said Gillis, MLIS’22, a PhD candidate in the art and visual culture program in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities.
She thinks of Alfred T. Jones, a successful Black business owner whose apothecary sat on the corner of Dundas and Ridout Streets, across from the courthouse in the 1850s. His brother, A.B. Jones, owned a dry goods store further down Dundas close to Talbot Street. However, unlike the courthouse and other colonial buildings, there are no photographs or archival reminders of their presence.
“The erasure is shocking to me,” she said.
It’s a reality she’s helping to address as a graduate research assistant working on The Black Londoners Project (BLP), a digital, interactive archive that recovers the histories of formerly enslaved individuals who fled the U.S. and settled in London, Ont. in the mid-19 thcentury.
English studies professors Miranda Green-Barteet and Alyssa MacLean conceived the idea of the site, inspired by the oral testimonies of 16 freedom seekers, who shared their stories with Benjamin Drew, a white author from Boston, Mass., who had ties to the abolitionist community. Drew presents their accounts in his book A North-Side View of Slavery; The Refugee: or the Narratives of Fugitive Slaves in Canada.