African Landing Day Brings Hundreds To Hampton; Site of Future Memorial

By New Journal and Guide Staff

HAMPTON

This year’s  African Landing Day Commemoration August 23-25 at Fort Monroe opened its Saturday ceremony at the future site of the African Landing Memorial near the Old Point Comfort Lighthouse. The $9 million memorial is expected to open in 2025.

The movement to construct the memorial dates back to the 1990s and efforts by Project 1619, Inc., a non-profit organization founded by Calvin Pearson of Hampton. Project 1619 was created in 1994 with a mission to tell the true history about the first African people taken to Virginia – and their true point of arrival at what is now Hampton.

The Commemoration is held in August to honor the first captured Africans brought in chains from Angola in August 1619 to North America and to highlight their legacy of culture, identity, resistance and triumph.

Other activities during Saturday included the blending of American and Angolan soil, a Parade of African Nations, a Flower Petal Ceremony, a drum call and a bell ringing ceremony. Guest performers included Sheila Arnold, storyteller; Leah Glenn Dance Theatre; KAM Kelly & The DAY Program and Tidewater African Cultural Alliance. Special remarks were delivered by visiting Angolans, Hampton Mayor Donnie Tuck, the Tucker Family, Senator Mamie Locke and others.

The Fort Monroe Authority is in charge of the memorial landing site. After it opens, tourists will glimpse a reconstructed version of the land that was brutally real to enslaved Africans who first set foot on Virginia soil in 1619. Organizers said each piece is “loaded with information” about the history of those first Africans, who were forcibly shipped from Africa to the landing site in Virginia.

“This is where it all began, so-called American civilization,” retired Hampton University historian Bill Wiggins said in a recent WHRO interview. “For better or worse.”

“This means what began as “a very, very far-fetched goal,” said  Wiggins, “will become a true reality next year. “

Organizers hope the memorial will spark reflection and a deeper understanding of the story of the United States.

“The memorial is a storyline, and the storyline actually starts in Africa,” Fort Monroe Authority CEO Glenn Oder explained. “It tells about their life in Africa. We talk about the Middle Passage. We talk about resistance.”