The Wilmington Journal Breakfast Club (WJBC), a community service group in association with the Wilmington Journal newspaper, announced during a press conference at Gregory Congregational Church UCC on Thursday, Sept. 7th, that in association with the R.S and T.C. Jervay Foundation, it is sponsoring a symposium commemorating the 125th anniversary of the 1898 Wilmington Massacre.
And, as part of that symposium commemoration, starting Sept. 9th, the WJBC is sponsoring the first Mary Alice Jervay Thatch Memorial 1898 Student Essay Competition, where New Hanover County students, grades 8 – 12, are challenged to write a 500-word essay about the 1898 Wilmington Massacre, and why learning about it is important to the community today.
The competition is named after the late publisher/editor of The Wilmington Journal newspaper, Ms. Mary Alice Jervay Thatch, who died in December 2021.
Veteran New Hanover County educator, and former co-chair of the 1898 Centennial Foundation, Dr. Bertha Boykin Todd, shared why she feels the student essay competition is an important part of the 1898 Wilmington Massacre 125th anniversary commemoration.
“For 39 years, I served as an educator in the New Hanover County Public School System,” Dr. Todd said in a statement. “During my tenure, nothing was ever mentioned regarding the atrocity of the massacre and coup that occurred in Wilmington, NC in 1898. Years later white and black students who graduated from Williston, Hoggard and New Hanover High Schools have questions regarding the reasons why educators did not teach them about the violence and successful coup. “My best wishes to you as your “Essay Competition” [will] aid in creating a greater awareness regarding this tragedy. “
Student participants can go to the website “1898symposium.org” to click the link for the entry rules, guidelines and application. There is no entry fee. Parental permission is required.
Students who compete will have the extra incentive of winning a $500.00 grand prize for the best 1898 essay. The prizes also include $300.00 for the second place essay, and $200.00 for the third place essay about 1898.
The student competition will officially begin on Saturday. Sept. 9th, and end on Saturday, Oct. 21st, 2023. The student winners will be determined by a panel of educators who will judge submitted essays based on an established scoring rubric for how comprehensive their submissions are. The three student winners will be awarded on Nov. 11th during the symposium.
“While this year’s event commemorates 125 years of deferred justice, it also offers hope for a new lens perspective on how we might create divergent justice pathways,” says Christina Davis McCoy, of Blueprint NC and WJBC. “The Mary Alice Jervay Thatch Memorial 1898 Student Essay Competition will invite and engage voices of young people for whom Wilmington’s past intrinsically defines and informs their future. We are significantly excited to read their perspectives of the November 10, 1898, Wilmington events.”
The 1898 symposium, the second in a series, will feature both nationally known and local panelists discussing how the community goes forward from the legacy of the 1898 Wilmington Massacre today. Those panelists include Bishop William Barber, president of Repairers of the Breach and co-convener of the national Poor People’s Campaign; Dr. Bertha B. Todd, retired educator and author of the book, Reflections on a Massacre and a Coup; atty. Irving L. Joyner, vice chairman of the 1898 Wilmington Race Massacre Commission; Ms. Inez Campbell-Eason, descendant of an 1898 Black family; Dr. Timothy Tyson, Duke University History professor and author of the book, The Blood of Emmitt Till; and Rev. Robert Parrish, pastor of Gregory Congregational Church UCC.
The 1898 symposium will be held Saturday, November 11th, 1 to 4 p.m. at Williston Middle School, 401 South 10th Street. This community event is free and open to the public.
The goal of the1898 symposium, according to WJBC President Paul Jervay, is to “Bring the 1898 Assessment Alive” through the District, consisting of Gregory Congregational Church, the Wilmington Journal, and the surrounding neighborhood; through restoring Gregory Church, and the Wilmington Journal buildings; through acting on the recommendations of the 1898 Commission to facilitate economic and social justice solutions; through revisiting 7-Solution Action Points recommended by Bishop William Barber II in 1998, and through reuniting dispersed people, resulting from the 1898 Massacre, with a new mission of Restoration, Reparation, and Repair.
For more information, contact Paul Jervay, Jr. at prjervay@gmail.com, or Cash Michaels at submit1898@gmail.com.
