The African American Experience Project in Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Join the East Tennessee Historical Society on June 16, 2021, at 11:00 a.m. via Zoom as Project Lead Antoine Fletcher and Research Assistant Atalya Dorfield introduce us to the African American Experience Project in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Begun in 2018, this project is a collaborative effort with park partners and the community to document and share the untold stories of African Americans in and outside the Smokies. These stories have been shared by many African Americans around crackling campfires, sun-beaten front porches, and lamp lit bedrooms, but they have yet to be shared with the world. To tell this story, the park is conducting research into African American experiences in the Great Smoky Mountains region of Appalachia from constructed 1540s to the present day.

This program is one in a series of Zoom Brown Bag programs and Saturday lectures to be offered this spring and summer, sponsored by the Albers Family Foundation in memory of Harriet Z. Albers and by Gentry-Griffey Funeral Home in Knoxville. The East Tennessee Historical Society is privileged to share regional history with our members and the public.

The “African American Experience” program is free. We ask participants to email eths@eastTNhistory.org to register. We will email the Zoom link prior to the program.

About the East Tennessee Historical Society

Established in 1834, the East Tennessee Historical Society is widely acknowledged as one of the most active history organizations in the state and enjoys a national reputation for excellence in programming and education. For 187 years, the East Tennessee Historical Society has been helping East Tennesseans hold on to our unique heritage—recording the events, collecting the artifacts, and saving the stories that comprise the history we all share.