“A New Door for My People” Black Life in Reconstruction-Era Louisiana

Join the Historic New Orleans Collection and the REACH Center of the New Orleans Public Library for “A New Door for My People,” a half-day public program exploring Black life in Reconstruction-era Louisiana. Moderated by Mark Roudané, whose great-great-grandfather co-founded the radical newspaper the New Orleans Tribune, the program will feature scholars Justene Hill Edwards (University of Virginia) on the Freedman’s Bank, Tera Hunter (Princeton University) on family reunification, and William D. Jones (Sam Houston State University) on the Freedman’s Bureau and Home Colonies.

Four years after the United States nearly tore itself apart in the Civil War, more than 330,000 African American men, women, and children living in Louisiana transitioned from slavery to freedom. The next 12 years—a time known as Reconstruction, from 1865 to 1877—were filled with hope, hard work, and hardship as newly freed men and women sought new possibilities. Hettie Pierce, who had been enslaved in north Louisiana, described the era as a time of “big excitement. I knew that at last the good Lord had opened a new door for my people.”

Reconstruction was a dynamic age when African American citizenship became an active reality rather than a deferred ideal. African American men, armed with suffrage and newly elected to public office, helped draft and pass one of America’s most progressive Constitutions, which guaranteed equal access to public education and accommodations and broadened the privileges of citizenship for all. New doors also opened outside the statehouse—in towns, villages, and cities across Louisiana, as freedmen and women forged community; reunited with family separated during enslavement; established churches, schools, and fraternal organizations; and began saving for the future.

Limited free parking is available on site. Additional free street parking is available surrounding the REACH center.

Host or Publisher Jefferson Performing Arts Center