The Hoover Institution kicked off its inaugural Juneteenth Freedom Day (June 19) celebration with a panel featuring Tad and Dianne Taube Director Condoleezza Rice; Senior Fellow Caroline Hoxby; and Robert J. and Marion E. Senior Fellow Shelby Steele. W. Glenn Campbell Research Fellow Kiron Skinner moderated the conversation, and Duignan Distinguished Visiting Fellow Jendayi Frazer provided concluding remarks. Following the event, attendees had an opportunity to view a small exhibition of materials from the Library & Archives’ collections documenting an array of African American experiences in the twentieth century.
Among the items on display were original civil rights era posters by artist Billy Morrow Jackson, an album containing photo postcards of American athlete Jesse Owens at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, a booklet of sit-in songs published by the Congress of Racial Equity (CORE), and a letter to Herbert Hoover from an African American WWI veteran detailing the experiences of his mother who endured life as a slave in Mississippi.
The display also included a newly acquired album which features more than 160 photographs of African American women who served in the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) and Women's Army Corps (WAC) during World War II.
The event, which also included a BBQ lunch, provided an opportunity for Hoover and Stanford staff and fellows to connect and celebrate both the meaning of Juneteenth (a newly recognized national federal holiday commemorating the emancipation of African Americans from slavery in 1865) and how the Hoover Institution Library & Archives serves to document and preserve the records of the struggle for freedom in the modern era.
Collections included in the display are open and available for research by reservation in the reading room and some online: New Left Collection, Lucius D. Jones Miscellany, Truman Smith Papers, WWII Pictorial Collection, and Poster Collection (US 7385, US 8066, US 8064, US 7434).
Photos (Hoover Institution Library & Archives) Hoover Director Condoleezza Rice, Stanford Provost Persis Drell, and Stanford professor and Hoover senior fellow Norman Naimark checking out the exhibit outside Hauck Auditorium (Top left photo by: Laurent Cruveillier). Display of Hoover Library & Archives artifacts outside Hauck Auditorium (Left photo by: Samira Bozorgi). Curator for North American collections Jean Cannon and Exhibits Manager Samira Bozorgi speaking at Hoover’s Juneteenth event (Right photo: Mireya Salinas).
