"Call My Name" with Dr. Rhondda Thomas

When Dr. Rhondda Robinson Thomas began as a postdoctoral fellow at Clemson University, she was told on her first day that the campus was built on land that was formerly John C. Calhoun and his wife Floride’s Fort Hill Plantation. When she toured the historical building months later, there was no mention of the enslaved people who used to work and live on the land, deemed that talking about the history of slavery would be "too controversial." 

Thus, the Call My Name Initiative was born. Focusing on those forgotten, "Call My Name is a research project dedicated to telling the stories of Black men, women, and children throughout Clemson University’s history whose lives and experiences have been largely overlooked in the University’s public history." Join us for an engaging and insightful talk with Dr. Thomas, where she'll discuss the initiative, her work on the project, and why this history cannot be forgotten. 

This program is presented in collaboration with the Pendleton Foundation for Black History & Culture and the Pendleton Historic Foundation as part of a series of events inspired by the memorial sculpture for five Anderson County victims of lynching and racial terror on exhibit in the Friends Gallery documented by the Anderson Area Remembrance & Reconciliation Initiative.