Upperman Center Symposium Exploring Justice, Education and Wilmington Ten

Wednesday November 02, 2022

The two-day symposium will explore justice, education and integration through the story of the Wilmington Ten.

The Wilmington Ten Symposium, hosted by the Superior African American Cultural Center, will feature presentations from UNCW faculty, community members, educators, and survivors of the Wilmington Ten members and those directly involved in their pardons.

Wilmington Ten groups of activists were wrongfully convicted of arson and conspiracy among integrated schools in Wilmington, NC. The issue drew national attention and support for their release. Their convictions were finally overturned in 1980, and the group was granted full amnesty in 2012.

Sean Palmer, executive director of the Upperman Center, said the symposium “illuminates the problems of integration and Black students and helps us to consider the relationship between power and education.”

“We hope we ask the audience to consider the depth of the struggle that permeates the tension of race in Wilmington,” he added. “We also hope that the people of Wilmington will gain a deeper understanding of its rational history and consider the ways in which Wilmington’s Ten Ambassadors demonstrate this in their daily lives.”

The symposium will be held November 9-10 on the UNCW campus. And it is open again. One of the many events hosted by the Senior Center this academic year was to celebrate 60 years of Black student life at UNCW. The symposium is a collaboration between the Graduate Center, the Department of History, Sociology and Criminology, the Honors College, the University College, the College of Health and Human Services and the Watson College of Education.

More information about the Wilmington Ten can be found in the Randall Library Archives. For more information about the symposium, contact Renee Clauson-Rivera, Upperman Center program coordinator, at [email protected].

Symposium Schedule

Wednesday 9 Nov

Film Showing & Discussion of “The Innocence of Veniae” in an interview with the journalists of Nummis Michaelis and Wilmington Ten Lawyer and NCCU Law Professor Irving Joyner
Noon – 2:30 pm, Lumina Theatre
Speaker: Cash Michaels, journalist; and Irving Joyner, Wilmington Ten Lawyer and NCCU Law Professor Irving Joyner

Wilmington Ten with Babette Boyd and teaching faculty
4 – 5 pm, Fisher University Union, Carolina Room
Moderated by Senior Lecturer in Criminology Babette Boyd, JD, with UNCW faculty and staff

Truth, Racial Healing and the Cause of Reparation
4 – 8 pm, Morton Auditorium
The Restorative Justice Collaborative at UNCW hosts panel discussions and workshops focused on the aftermath of the 1898 Wilmington Massacre and its connections to today’s liberation movements. Rregistration is required. Visit tinyurl.com/UNCWRJC for details.

Surviving Wilmington with Wilmington 10
6 – 7:30 pm, Fisher University Union, Azalea Coast Room
Speaker: Francis DeCoursey; Wilmington Ten member Willie Vereen; Rev. Kojo Nantambu, leader of the Wilmington Ten boycott and former President of the Charlotte NAACP; and Irving Joyner, a Wilmington Ten lawyer and North Carolina Central University law professor

on Thursday 10 Nov

Strategizing Movement: Educators & Politics Wilmington
Noon – 2 pm, Madeline Suites
Speaker: Bertha Todd, civil rights attorney and former Williston Senior High School librarian, and Dr. Charles Foust, superintendent of New Hanover County Schools.

What we learn from Wilmington’s Ten: Today’s activism & advocacy with Lettie Gore
6 – 7:30 pm, Warwick Ballroom
Speaker: Lettie Gore, historian and lawyer

—Come on Jenkins

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