For the month of February, the Hagen History Center will be recognizing African Americans in Erie County: A Trail of Shared Heritage (The Trail).
The Trail is a community history project that dates back to 2013, that continues to inspire us about Erie’s Black History. Hagen History Center planned to present multiple images for each stop on the Trail, but then realized our collections lack visual materials for a few of the stops.
To help us rectify this, we are inviting readers to become Citizen Archivists.
A Citizen Archivist is a term coined in 2010 by the National Archives and describes a virtual volunteer who helps professional archivists by locating and uploading relevant information, tagging, and adding metadata to already established online archives.
Click the link for the Trail, and if you happen to have documents, photographs, maps, or other images associated with a trail number, send us a message on social media! We will be posting a few times a week, so stay tuned!
Trail #1: African Americans in the Battle of Lake Erie State Historical Marker: Erie Maritime Museum - 150 E. Front Street, Erie Outside the Erie Maritime Museum and U.S. Brig Niagara is the marker dedicated to African American sailors who fought alongside Oliver Hazard Perry in the Battle of Lake Erie during the War of 1812. Museum exhibits offer a history of the Battle and Perry’s crew, 20% of whom were Black.
