In Partnership with State Representative Lindsay Sabadosa, Mass Humanities, and Community Partners
Reading Frederick Douglass Together 2025
A Public Reading of Frederick Douglass's 1852 Fourth of July Address
A Public Reading of Frederick Douglass's 1852 Fourth of July Address
On the Grounds of Historic Northampton, 46 Bridge Street, Northampton, MA
Saturday, July 5, 2025 at 11 am
Rain date: Sunday, July 6, 2025 at 11 am
Reading Frederick Douglass Together 2025
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Reading Frederick Douglass Together brings people together to read aloud Frederick Douglass’s speech, What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?
Copies of Douglass’s speech will be distributed to all in attendance. The public can take turns reading passages from it in succession. Come to listen or come to read a passage. Dr. Ousmane Power-Greene will give the opening and closing remarks for the 2025 Northampton event. Power-Greene is chair of the Northampton Reparations Study Commission and a professor of history at Clark University. The event is free and open to the public. 200 chairs will be available. Feel free to bring your own chair. Douglass first delivered the speech in 1852, in Corinthian Hall, Rochester, New York to the Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society. The themes addressed in the speech still resonate with Americans more than 150 years after they were written. Now more than ever, the speech forces us to reckon with the legacy of slavery and the promises of democracy. |
Frederick Douglass had strong ties to the Northampton Association of Education and Industry in Florence and spoke in downtown Northampton in the 1840s about slavery and the abolitionist movement.
Reading Frederick Douglass Together is a statewide initiative coordinated by Mass Humanities. Now in its 15th year, the program will take place in communities across Massachusetts. The Northampton event is presented in partnership with State Representative Lindsay Sabadosa and community sponsors. Historic Northampton received a Reading Frederick Douglass Together grant from Mass Humanities with funding made possible by the Mass Cultural Council.
Illuminating Truth: A Special Presentation on Parsons House
An Outdoor Slideshow by Whitney Designworks
At Historic Northampton outside 58 Bridge Street
Thursday, July 3, 2025 at 8:30 pm to 10 pm
Saturday, July 5, 2025 at 8:30 pm to 10 pm
Illuminating Truth: A Special Presentation on Parsons House
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Graphic silhouettes and historic documents from the new exhibit Slavery and Freedom in Northampton, 1654 to 1783 will be projected onto the 1719 Parsons family house at 58 Bridge Street in Northampton in an outdoor slideshow by Whitney Designworks of Northampton.
For at least 129 years, slavery was part of the fabric of everyday life in Northampton. At least 50 enslaved individuals lived here from the town’s English settlement in 1654 until 1783 when slavery was abolished in Massachusetts. The outdoor slideshow features graphic silhouettes of men, women, and children who were enslaved here. |
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Mass Cultural Council
Card to Culture |
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EBT, WIC, and ConnectorCare cardholders receive free or reduced admission
to Historic Northampton's events, public talks, and programs.
to Historic Northampton's events, public talks, and programs.
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Historic Northampton is proud to participate in Mass Cultural Council's Card to Culture program in collaboration with the Department of Transitional Assistance, the Department of Public Health's WIC Nutrition Program, the Massachusetts Health Connector, and hundreds of organizations by making cultural programming accessible to those for whom cost is a participation barrier.
To access this benefit, EBT, WIC, and ConnectorCare cardholders can select the CARD TO CULTURE option on the event registration page. Some exclusions apply.
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