Black history is American history
To a packed room, Mercer County Executive Brian M. Hughes and County Clerk Paula Sollami Covello co-hosted Mercer’s Annual Black History Month Celebration on Feb. 24.
Participants joined in song, storytelling and the sharing of history of African Americans and their contributions to the United States, during the event held at the McDade Administration Building Cafe.
This year’s special guests were members of the families of Gladys Hedgepeth and Berline Williams. Kyle Hedgepeth enraptured the audience with an accounting of his family’s part in the landmark legal case.
He recounted that Gladys Hedgepeth and Berline Williams of Trenton filed suit against the Trenton School Board when their children were refused admission to the newly built Junior High School No. 2. The new school was only a few blocks from their homes in the Wilbur section of the City, while the segregated Lincoln School was 2 miles away. With the assistance of the NAACP, Hedgepeth and Williams successfully fought the school district’s segregationist policy, and the landmark New Jersey Supreme Court case bears their names.
The case became a precedent for the Brown v. Board of Education ruling in 1954 and continued to influence many Affirmative Action and equal opportunity policies in New Jersey’s education system, as well as the eradication of laws supporting discrimination in New Jersey.
In addition to Clerk Sollami Covello and Mr. Hughes, others who spoke included Jocelyn White, retired Trenton educator; the Rev. Dr. John H. Harris Jr., pastor; and members of the Williams Family. Mercer County Deputy Superintendent of Elections Walker Worthy Jr. was the spirited emcee.
Additionally, Mercer County’s own Kya Collins, performed a soulful rendition of Ella Fitzgerald’s Summertime, composed in 1934 by George Gershwin for the opera “Porgy and Bess.” The original featured a cast of classically trained African-American singers—a daring artistic choice at the time.