SILSBEE, Texas — The great-great-grandson of a former Jasper County slave, is coming to the Ice House Museum Friday, February 23 at 7 p.m.
Fred McCray will be giving a free lecture about his family and his people's story of struggle and triumph of building their own community in post-slavery Jasper County in a special event to celebrate Black History Month.
The event will cover the freed slaves that migrated to Jasper County in search of jobs and opportunity. As more former slaves moved into the county, they began to construct black churches which were massively important in providing a sense of community. They also provided a helping hand to these newly freed men and women, according to Ice House Museum.
In Jasper County, they created colonies around these churches known as Freedom Colonies. This topic will be the focus of McCray's lecture Friday evening, as well as the strong centering's of the black community around the church and the prominence of black Ministers.
The Ice House Museum gladly invites people of all races to come listen and take part in the lecture that highlights an extremely interesting, and too often forgotten time in Southeast Texas history.