By: Tavon N. Thomasson
Special to the AFRO
The Harriet Tubman Spirit Awards honored local leaders March 21 at the Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum in Annapolis during a two-part program that also featured an artist discussion on history, memory and Black women’s stories.
Held during Maryland Day programming from March 19-25, the event was one of several programs commemorating the March 25, 1634, landing of European settlers on Maryland soil. At the Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum, the day centered on Black women’s impact across generations, beginning with a conversation on preserving history and ending with honors for leaders continuing Harriet Tubman’s legacy.
This year’s award recipients included AFRO CEO and Publisher Dr. Frances “Toni” Draper, Patricia Ross Hawkins and Dr. Tuajuanda Jordan, who were recognized for work in justice and community empowerment.
Jordan, president of Marietta College, said receiving the award was humbling and prompted her to reflect on how her life’s work has carried forward Tubman’s legacy.
“Harriet was led by God to get people out of slavery, and I’ve always been led to make sure that our people have the same experiences and opportunities in education as everyone else did,” Jordan said.
Credit: (AFRO Photos / Tavon Thomasson)
“The programs I’ve implemented and developed over my career have been about equity and providing experiences so that when our people walk out the door, they are as prepared as anyone else. When you think about freedom, that is a form of freedom,” she continued.
That commitment to a larger purpose also surfaced in Hawkins’ remarks. While grateful for the honor, she said her advocacy did not begin with public recognition in mind but from a personal need to represent her family.
“I didn’t do the work for the recognition,” Hawkins said. “ I did the work because somebody in our family at that time needed to stand up and be vocal enough to speak for our family so we could have a seat at the table, and that was me because Harriet was in me.”
Before the awards began, a live portrayal of Harriet Tubman connected the ceremony to the earlier artist talk featuring Charlyn Griffith-Oro, Darlene R. Taylor and Savannah G. M. Wood, whose work is included in “She Speaks: Black Women Artists and the Power of Historical Memory” exhibition.
During the panel, the artists discussed the work on display and how they use art to preserve Black history and honor the memory of the people at the center of those stories. For Taylor, that preservation can take the form of what she calls “heirloom cloth.”
“I use cloths found in vintage shops or that were passed down to me through the women in my life,” Taylor said. “I use those cloths as a way of holding on to legacy and the memory them.”
According to Taylor, memory lives in the cloth itself, especially in the stains and worn marks that point to a past life and the people who once carried it.
Credit: (AFRO Photos / Tavon Thomasson)
“Think of the marks that may have been from a child who was cut and grandma’s taps to make them feel better. It leaves a mark in that cloth,” Taylor said. “ It leaves a memory in that cloth. And for me, those are memories of Black family survival.”
By cutting and stitching together cloth, she creates textile images that tell stories and capture glimpses of the women represented in her work.
“Cloth allows me to kind of manipulate and tell a story in a particular way. I have whole pieces, then I cut them, and I blend those stories together,” she said. ”I’m shaping the environment these women moved in, walked in, worked in and loved their families in.”
Taylor also carries over pieces of cloth from one work to another, using shared textiles to emphasize the connection between the women and mothers represented in her art.
“I have about 40 pieces in my Heirlooms series, but there’s something that came from a mother from before that’s in that work, which is very much the way I see us sharing stories, the way I see that intergenerational connection,” she said.
The exhibit, which includes Taylor’s work alongside that of the other featured artists, will remain on display at the museum through Jan. 16, 2027. Together, the day’s artist talk and awards ceremony highlighted the importance of celebrating Black women not only as figures of history, but also as forces shaping the present.
She Speaks acknowledges Black women as active participants in the making of this country rather than passive bystanders, highlighting artists who operate as historians, archivists, and scholars to tell their stories. Presented alongside rarely seen archival materials and family heirlooms, the exhibition highlights the pivotal role Black women have played in shaping and preserving this nation since the Revolutionary era, while envisioning liberated futures through cosmic speculation.