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St. Pete’s Black History Month event calendar filling up

Bill DeYoung

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Friday, Jan 31 outside City Hall: Flag-raising with (from left): St. Petersburg City Councilmember Corey Givens Jr; Council Co-Chair Lisset Hanewicz; Terry Lipsey-Scott, director of the Woodson African American Museum; Mayor Ken Welch; Pinellas County School Board member Caprice Edmonds and Councilmember Richie Floyd. Photo: City of St. Petersburg.

To commemorate the start of Black History Month 2025, St. Petersburg Mayor Ken Welch and other representatives from local government raised a flag outside City Hall Friday. It honored Dr. Carter G. Woodson, the author and historian who founded Black History Month in 1926.

The city’s African American history museum is named for Woodson.

By raising the flag, Welch said, “We affirm a truth that cannot be denied: That Black history matters. And that Black history is American history.

“The colors of this flag represent the struggles, the triumphs and the spirit of a people who have shaped our city, our nation and our world.”

The flag, which will remain on the City Hall flagpole for the entire month of February, was raised following additional comments by City Council co-chair Lisset Hanewicz and by Terri Lipsey Scott, executive director of the Woodson African American Museum.

Several of the city’s major Black History Month events take place at the Woodson Museum, 2240 9th Avenue S.:

“Harriet Tubman: The Beacon of Hope.” Photo provided.

Sunday saw the public unveiling of Harriet Tubman: The Beacon of Hope, a sculpture of the iconic freedom fighter, in the museum’s Legacy Garden. The traveling sculpture is on loan from North Carolina’s Wofford Sculpture Studio;

Black History Trivia Night, at 6 p.m. Wednesday, features free admission and prizes for the winners (register here);

On Feb. 15, the 2025 Tampa Bay Collard Green Festival – a large and celebratory, food-centric event – takes place outdoors (and in) at the Woodson. Hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The Woodson is a co-sponsor of the Gallery at Creative Pinellas next exhibit, iMAGINE NATION, works by young St. Pete artist Jabari “iBOMS” Reed. The show runs Feb. 20-May 10 at the Creative Pinellas campus on Walsingham Road.

Bob Devin Jones’ 2021 “choreopoem” Until the River Never Grieves, a series of observations on the historical African experience, through the words of poet, artist and politician activist Aimé Césaire and Jones himself, has a special one-night-only reprise Feb. 11 at the Dali Museum.

Feb. 12 and 13 at Stageworks Theatre in Tampa: Black History They Don’t Want You to Know, spoken word by Charles Hines, hip hop and theater combine in a one-man program developed, written by and starring Lance Felton (one of the performers in Until the River Never Grieves) and directed by Bob Devin Jones.

Dr. Basha P. Jordan, Jr. will be at Tombolo Books Feb. 19 to discuss his book The Legacy of Elder Jordan Sr.: From Slavery to Philanthropy. Elder Jordan, his grandfather, was one of St. Petersburg’s founding fathers. Basha Jordan will be in conversation with Gwendolyn Reese, president of the African American Heritage Association of St. Petersburg.

Razed, a documentary from producers Andrew Lee and Tara Segall, along with Gwendolyn Reese, chronicles the story of St. Pete’s Gas Plant neighborhood, from the perspectives of those whose homes and businesses were torn down to make way for Tropicana Field and its acres of parking lots. Reese and representatives of the Foundation for a Healthy St. Petersburg will screen a preview of the film Feb. 11 at Tombolo Books.

Razed will premiere, in its entirety, Feb. 22 at the Foundation for a Healthy St. Petersburg’s Center for Health Equity, 2333 34th Street S. That 5 p.m. screening is full (tickets were free); at press time, additional screenings were being planned.

At St. Petersburg City Theatre Feb. 27: Moments in Black Film, screenings and conversation in celebration of “creativity in every frame.” With live entertainment. Sponsored by the Skyway Marina District.

 

 

 

 

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