This story was reported and written by VPM News.
The Black History Museum & Culture Center of Virginia, located in Richmond’s Jackson Ward, was one of the first sites chosen by UNESCO to educate the public on the history of the Transatlantic slave trade.
UNESCO, the education and culture agency of the United Nations, announced earlier this month at an event in Paris that 22 sites had been chosen for the inaugural class for its Network of Places of History and Memory linked to Enslavement and the Slave Trade.
The network, which includes sites in 10 countries, will share best practices for preserving and displaying the history of what UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay described in a statement released Monday as “humanity’s greatest crime.”
“The legacy of the Transatlantic Slave Trade still scars our societies. We must remember the places which bear witness to one of humanity’s greatest crimes,” Azoulay said. “Preserving and visiting these places will help us honor the memory of its millions of victims, advance scientific knowledge and educate new generations.”
The announcement came as part of the 30th anniversary of UNESCO's 1994 program, Routes of Enslaved Peoples: Resistance, Liberty and Heritage.
The Black History Museum, founded in 1981, was one of four American sites chosen, along with the International African American Museum in Charleston, S.C.; Penn Center, on St. Helena Island, S.C.; and President Lincoln’s Cottage in Northwest Washington, D.C.
Sites were also selected in Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Ghana, Haiti, Mauritius, Mexico, the Netherlands and Nigeria — highlighting the global scope of the slave trade.
The National Park Service added the museum to its African American Civil Rights Network — a list of sites that hold key places in America’s civil rights history — in August.
The museum is one of several places in Virginia’s capital that aim to preserve and commemorate Black culture and history in the commonwealth of Virginia — and beyond.
More are in the works, like the Shockoe Project, a planned museum and educational space in Shockoe Bottom that aims to recognize the city’s past as the second-largest slave market in the nation.
The project, which has been planned for nearly 15 years, will feature a 62,000-square-foot National Slavery Museum, green space and educational area akin to the National Mall in Washington, D.C.
An $11 million grant from the Mellon Foundation is funding the first phase of the project, which involves converting part of Main Street Station into an educational facility that is scheduled to open in fall 2025.
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