CLEVELAND — Peppered across Northeast Ohio are spots of Black history from memories, statues or gardens honoring Black ancestors.
The African American Cultural Garden is one of those spots; the four acres on MLK are hard to miss, and Keisha Chambers wants to make sure Ohioans know the history behind it.
"A lot of this isn’t taking place in the schools right now so it’s really up to us as a community to make sure we share these stories,” said Chambers. “In often cases, you want to make sure that everybody is proud, so it’s not just something that Black people should be involved in but everybody."
Chambers is the owner of ‘This is Black Cleveland’, giving tours of all of the historic spots across Northeast Ohio.
This Saturday, Chambers be offering tours in commemoration of Juneteenth.
The historian walks attendees through dozens of locations, like the origin of the Hough riots near 79th and Hough Avenue.
“We should at least go visit them, understand the history, experience a moment of reverence and try to reflect on what those contributions were," said Chambers.
News 5 was there as Chambers walked students through the African American Cultural Gardens, symbolizing how Africans were taken from their homeland, shipped across the Atlantic and used as slaves.
"It was great because I didn’t know anything about the cultural gardens,” said eighth-grader Serenity Jones.
"It was good to learn about my history and stuff and what happened back then, and how life is now and how the slaves struggled," said eighth-grader Ronnie Hunter.
Topics surrounding race are a controversial topic across our country right now; Chambers hopes her tours can fill the gap by teaching everyone about black history.
“As those avenues of expanding our education get blocked, there need to be other paths for people to learn about the history and what those contributions are,” said Chambers. “There needs to be other avenues, and it’s not always up to the schools to teach our students. As a community, we need to teach our students as well."
For more details about 'This is Black Cleveland' and Saturday's walking tour, contact 216-236-4042 or click here.
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