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Welcome Back!

I’m returning to the  blogsphere after a long absence.  Although, I haven’t been submitting post on a regular basis, I continue to read and admire the great work being written on a daily basis.

Who am I?  I am a retired New York City public school teacher.  History, economics, and literature were the subjects that I devoted over twenty years teaching to students in Brownsville, Coney Island and Staten Island.  It was challenging, frustrating but I enjoyed every minute of everyday attempting to help young people find themselves and succeed in a very difficult world.

Politics, voting rights, state politics are a few of the subjects I hope to write about.  We are living in a period of reactionary politics:  how could a realty show host organize a viable campaign for the presidency?  Our government leaders have made it more difficult for people to vote; they are trying to restrict immigration into the country; Islamphobia is rampant across the land.  “The best lack all convictions, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity..” as has been written.

I would love to connect with the general reading public, and join the conversation about the future of the country, and how we all can get involved to strengthened our democracy.  Over the next year, I will hope to continue to improve my craft, and join the ranks of the many wonderful writers who are setting the agenda for this nation and the world.

Historic Birthday!!!

St. Philips

St. Philips’s Moravian Church celebrated its 193rd birthday on Sunday, May 3, at its current house of worship on Bon Air Avenue.  On Sunday, congregants and visitors were served Moravian tea and bread, and listen to jazz in honor of the church’s historic beginning as a house of worship for enslaved Africans.

Historians have documented that St. Philips was the focal point for enslaved Africans in early Salem.  It is the oldest black Moravian congregation and oldest surviving African-American Church in North Carolina.  Archaeologists have traced the church’s history to 1822 when “Thirty Negroes gathered to lay up the logs for the church for Negroes,” according to Winston-Salem: A History written by Frank Tursi.  

Enslaved blacks learned to read and write at the the structure in Old Salem.  The church was known as the “Negro congregation” or the Colored Salem Moravian Church before being renamed St. Philips. There are some historical artifacts that suggested it was named for Philip the Evangelist, who baptized an Ethiopian.  In 1950, the building was relocated to in Happy Hills before settling in to its current location on Bon Air Avenue.

In 1989, a group of representatives from the Moravian Church, St. Philip’s and Old Salem Inc. fought to restore the original St. Philips’ site,  They received funding from private and government sources to repair the old structure, which had deteriorated over the years, and eventually had the building added to the National Register of Historic Places.

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