Team Slavery Inventory Database (SID) went on a fabulous #fieldtripfriday! We are so grateful to Kenny Sholes of the Montgomery County, Maryland Historic Ag Reserve for being our guide and leading us to some fantastic places. First stop was the historic Black community of Sugarland where we met descendants Gwendora Hebron Reece & Suzanne R. Johnson. We were also joined by Jeff Sypeck and Glenn Wallace Weitz. All four are members of the Sugarland EthnoHistory Project and authors of ‘I Have Started for Canaan: The Story of the African American Town of Sugarland’. It was really exciting to see a group of descendants and community members come together to tell the story of this small yet hugely important community. And I say hugely important because all of these small, dwindling, historic Black communities were our backbones. They were here, on the land, long before any 20th century development and in some cases already established prior to the Civil War. We were so happy to have spent some time with these folks.
