In gratitude for the sacrifice of the African Ancestors who built what is now Van Cortlandt Park, the African Burial Ground located within the park, was consecrated during a special, live-streamed Juneteenth ceremony on June 19.

 

Cultural consultant, Peggy King Jorde, hosted the proceedings. According to newjersey.com, King Jorde has been involved in memorializing and preserving African burial grounds for nearly 30 years, after what started as a one-time project on a Manhattan site during her time working in the design and construction office of former New York City mayor, the late David Dinkins.

That work grew into a passion that drove King Jorde to international activism, and the work on that first pioneering ancient burial ground project in Manhattan has served to inform and guide other similar preservation projects all over the United States, as well as on the island of St. Helena, located in the South Atlantic Ocean, a midway point along the transatlantic slave route.

 

Speaking to UN News in November 2020, King Jorde explained that the Manhattan project had been the first to garner a huge level of civic engagement and this inspired the setting of a precedent in preserving other such historical sites.

Speaking to the importance of the work, she said at the time, “In unearthing some of not necessarily the remains, but getting to the top surface of the ground, there are things that archaeologists can learn or be able to convey to the community, and help build that picture of who these people were, who the community was, how they were laid to rest, but more than anything else, the burial ground is a tangible reminder.”

 

She added, “It is a kind of site that [for] everyone, in some personal way whether you are of African descent or not, resonates or has significant meaning. It’s real. You know that there are people who are lying there and that that is unquestionable history that is before you.”

Meanwhile, ahead of a live viola performance, acclaimed musician and director of curriculum and artist development for the Bronx Arts Ensemble, Judith Insell, said she was incredibly honored to share the music of the group’s teaching artists, and artists in general, with the audience. “On behalf of the Bronx Arts Ensemble, our board, our board chair, Bob Fanuzzi, myself, as executive director, our teaching artists, our musicians, we all are so humbled to be asked to present at this event, an event that is of the greatest importance to our organization,” she said.

 

“To honor the ancestors of African enslaved individuals today is one of the highest honors we could be asked to give our talents to,” she added. “So, with that said, I am going to give you some of my talent.” She then performed, “I want Jesus to walk with me.”

Among other participants and attendees were Congressman Jamaal Bowman (NY-16), Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz (A.D. 81), and District 11 Councilman Eric Dinowitz. For his part, Bowman said that it was with a lot of emotion that he spoke at the event. “I want to thank everyone who was involved in putting this event together,” he said. “I want to thank everyone who was involved in not letting us forget our history because Black history is our history, and African history is our history.”

 

The program also included “traditional negro spirituals,” performed by soloist, Beverly Fleming-Camejo, remarks by artist and historian, Kamau Ware, curator of the Black Gotham Experience exhibition at the Museum of the History of New York in Manhattan, and a benediction by Rev. Dr. Hermon L. Darden, senior pastor at St. Stephen’s United Methodist Church.

The program for the event was presented respectfully by Van Cortlandt Park Alliance, Van Cortlandt Park House Museum, Kingsbridge Historical Society, and by the “Enslaved People Project” task force steering committee at the City’s Parks’ department. It was supported, in part, by public funds from the City’s department of cultural affairs in partnership with the City Council.

 

The libation, which is the act of pouring out a drink as an offering to a deity, was presided over by Chief Baba Neil Clarke, who explained he would be using the Olukumi dialect of speech during the ceremony. According to SciELO South Africa, Olukumi, along with Yoruba, is spoken in Nigeria, and is an endangered language.

 

“I’m here as a musician, but I’m also here as clergy to function in this capacity,” Clarke said, adding that his colleague, Khuent Rose Steelpan, was there in a similar capacity. He contextualized the ceremony by referencing the ongoing civil rights struggle in the country and “the state and foundation of this democratic experiment that we are purportedly participating in.”

He explained that the African Ancestors who were brought to the United States were aristocrats, statesmen, economists, blacksmiths, hunters, agriculturalists, navigators, architects, carpenters, bakers, herdsmen, horsemen, tanners, historians, scholars, community leaders and urban planners.

 

“All of that disappears under this label of slaves or enslavement,” he said. “In addition to being brilliant singers, dancers, musicians, instrument makers, craftsmen, acrobats, athletes, dramatists, is this knowledge… those skills are the roots of the resourcefulness, the creativity, the resilience so fundamental to these United States, to the contributions that were made to these United States, that this country has been late to acknowledge and give credit to.”

 

Clarke continued, “These are the people who we are here today to give the recognition to, and to pay homage to and honor…. not slaves, not just enslaved people, but to all those qualities, all of those characters, all of those skills that these individuals embody, that they brought to this stolen land to help build this country that we know today as the United States.”

He went on to explain that in the African tradition there has always been an acknowledgement of life, of existence and of the universe within which people exist. “It is the spoken Word that we use because in the beginning, there was the Word, and the Word ‘God’ was ‘God’ and the Word was with God so, this is nothing unusual. This is something in Africa [that] is nothing strange,” he said.

 

“This is something that Africans have always done, in acknowledgement of this that we are part of, not in control or not in direction of, because if you leave this asphalt for too long, guess what? It’s going to get taken back,” he said.

 

He then explained that during libation, people paid homage to the Creator and  to all the forces that are emanations of the energy of the Creator, the Alpha and the Omega, and to all of those individuals and entities that people are subject to, and dependent on, and coexist with, in order to complete life’s journey as spiritual beings, in a human incarnation, on a journey of a lifetime.

During the central stage of the libation ceremony, Clarke said, “Sometimes, water is used because water is the substance of life.” He added, “Without water, there is no life. Sometimes an alcoholic drink is used because it is a stimulant, and it is to stimulate the spirit.”

 

In conclusion, referring once again to the Ancient Ancestors, he said, “They are celebrated for the sacrifices that they made so that we could be here today, because the only reason that we see as far as we do is because we stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before us.”