A false bottom wagon display showing some of the measures slaves would have to take to escape slavery in the US through the Underground Railroad to Canada. (Photo courtesy Brittany Miles of the John Freeman Walls Historic Site and Underground Railroad Museum)A false bottom wagon display showing some of the measures slaves would have to take to escape slavery in the US through the Underground Railroad to Canada. (Photo courtesy Brittany Miles of the John Freeman Walls Historic Site and Underground Railroad Museum)
Windsor

Windsor area celebrates the end of slavery

Emancipation Day celebrations are underway in Windsor-Essex.

August 1 is Emancipation Day and marks when slavery was abolished throughout the British Colonies in 1834.

The Windsor area played a prominent role in the Underground Railroad by helping slaves escape the southern U.S.

On Friday, the Amherstburg Freedom Museum will host its annual Emancipation Celebration Dinner and Dance at the Fogolar Furlan in Windsor. The event will recognize the 185th anniversary of the Abolition of Slavery in Canada in 1834. The life and legacy of Alton C. Parker, the first Black detective in Canada, will also be honoured.

Tickets can be bought online at Eventbrite.ca.

The celebration will continue on August 10 when the Museum will host the annual Walter Perry Emancipation Golf Classic at Belleview Golf Club in Woodslee.

"The Amherstburg Freedom Museum is a curated archive that preserves and shares Amherstburg’s stories of the Underground Railroad, and the compassion and solidarity it took to make this network possible," said Curator Mary-Katherine Whelan. "Amherstburg meant freedom, as the Canadian destination for many Blacks escaping slavery in the United States."

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