Daniel Thorp Book Signing "Facing Freedom: An African American Community in Virginia"
Venue: Christiansburg Library, Christiansburg
Organizations: Daniel Thorp
Date: Saturday, February 24, 2018
Time: 2:00 - 4:00 PM
Event Types: Speaking Engagements
Cost: Free
Description:
Christiansburg Library presents Daniel Thorp Book Signing "Facing Freedom: An African American Community in Virginia from Reconstruction to Jim Crow" on Saturday, February 24, 2018.

Daniel Thorp will talk about his new book "Facing Freedom: An African American Community in Virginia from Reconstruction to Jim Crow". "Facing Freedom" reveals the stories and strategies of those who pioneered these resilient bulwarks against the rising tide of racism.

In "Facing Freedom", Daniel Thorp relates the complex experience of an African American community in Montgomery County, Virginia as it negotiated a radically new world in the four decades following the Civil War. Drawing on extensive research in private collections as well as local, state, and federal records, Thorp narrates in intimate detail the experiences of black Appalachians as they struggled to establish autonomous families, improve their economic standing, operate black schools within a white-controlled school system, form independent black churches, and exercise expanded, if contested—roles, as citizens and members of the body politic.

Black out-migration increased markedly near the close of the nineteenth century, but the generation that transitioned from slavery to freedom in Montgomery County established the community institutions that would survive disenfranchisement and Jim Crow.

Books will be available for purchase and signing after the program.

Daniel Thorp was born in North Carolina, but spent the early years of his life in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. After high school, Thorp returned to North Carolina where he went on to graduate from Davidson College in 1976. During his college years he spent summers as a guide at the Gettysburg National Military Park, inspiring him to continue the study of history. He went on to complete graduate work in Colonial American history, ultimately earning both a Masters and a Doctorate from Johns Hopkins University.

Dr. Daniel Thorp has been teaching at Virginia Tech since 1986, and is now an Associate Professor of History. He has also taught at East Carolina University and Sutherland University in England and spent six months as a Fulbright Scholar in Wellington, New Zealand. He is the author of multiple books and a number of articles.

Link: https://liberalarts.vt.edu/faculty-directory/history-faculty/daniel-thorp.html

For more information, visit: http://www.montgomery-floyd.lib.va.us/ or https://www.facebook.com/pages/Christiansburg-Library-Montgomery-Floyd-Regional-Library-System-Va/343472325300 or call 540-382-6965.