Evans County African American Archive Museum

Selected by statewide cultural heritage stakeholders and funded by the DLG’s competitive digitization grant program, over 3,000 pages of digitized African American funeral programs from Evans County, Georgia, and other Southeastern towns and cities are now freely available in the Digital Library of Georgia and can be seen online here:

African American Funeral Programs, 1960-2022

The collection of 637 individual programs dates between 1961-2022, with the birth dates of the people represented going back to 1870.

Pharris D. Johnson, former mayor of Bellville, Georgia, chairman of the Savannah College of Art and Design Board of Trustees, and Vice President of the Evans County Historical Society says:

“The Evans County Community Center and African American Archive Museum serves our community in an outstanding manner. They accomplish their mission with a small budget and through dedicated volunteers. As we know, funeral programs provide valuable social and genealogical information. [These materials from] the Evans County Community Center Archives are an important resource for the residents of Evans and surrounding counties.”

Documenting an underrepresented region of Georgia, this collection provides important information for genealogical research and for understanding African American life during different time periods.

Funeral programs provide valuable social and genealogical information and typically include a photograph of the deceased individual, an obituary, a list of surviving relatives, and information about the funeral service. Some programs provide more extensive genealogical information such as birth and death dates, maiden names, past residences, accomplishments, affiliations, and burial locations. For marginalized populations, this information can often be difficult to find, as the records of many in these communities were often either destroyed, kept privately, or never created in the first place.

The Evans County African American Archive Museum has collected funeral programs for over twenty years. Since then, residents have contributed to the collection.

Darin McCoy of the Evans County Historical Society notes:

“[Our] facility operates within an under-served rural county in terms of digitized African American history. However, the Evans County Historical Society alumni and the Evans County African American Archive Museum leadership team are well-known advocates for the preservation and collection of local African American history and artifacts. Our featured displays, public events, and family presentations are unique and emphasize the historical value of these entities. The vision, collections, and the preservation of artifacts, begun over twenty (20) years ago, have now come to fruition.”

Digitization and access have been made possible through the Digital Library of Georgia’s competitive digitization subgrant program and are displayed and searchable within their online portal. The Digital Library of Georgia has also partnered with local libraries and the Georgia Public Library Service to digitize African American funeral programs for people connected to the Atlanta, Augusta-Richmond County, and Thomas County areas.

About the Evans County African American Archive Museum (Claxton, Ga.)

The mission of the Evans County African American Archive Museum is to provide means for all citizens of Evans County to obtain an excellent quality of life through programs and services. The Archive was the recipient of a 2021 GHRAC Award for History Advocacy. Their Facebook group is: https://www.facebook.com/Evans-County-Community-Center-343942125941003/

Selected images from the collection:

Title: Funeral program for Charles L. Bailey
URL: https://dlg.usg.edu/record/eccca_aafp-ec_ecaaam-470
Collection: African American Funeral Programs, 1960-2022
Courtesy of the Evans County Community Center (Claxton, Ga.)
Description: Funeral program for Charles L. Bailey. Date of funeral service: June 18, 2011. Location of funeral service: St. John Missionary Baptist Church, Claxton, Georgia, 11:00 a.m. Birth date: November 19, 1916. Death date: June 12, 2011.

Title: Funeral program for Earlene Harris
URL: https://dlg.usg.edu/record/eccca_aafp-ec_ecaaam-632
Collection: African American Funeral Programs, 1960-2022
Courtesy of the Evans County Community Center (Claxton, Ga.)
Description: Funeral program for Earlene Harris. Date of funeral service: November 4, 2021. Location of funeral service: Beulah Baptist Church, Atlanta, Georgia, 11:00 a.m. Birth date: April 8, 1935. Death date: October 28, 2021.

Title: Funeral program for Reverend Lee Jones
URL: https://dlg.usg.edu/record/eccca_aafp-ec_ecaaam-402
Collection: African American Funeral Programs, 1960-2022
Courtesy of the Evans County Community Center (Claxton, Ga.)
Description: Funeral program for Reverend Lee Jones. Date of funeral service: June 5, 2008. Location of funeral service: Pittman Park United Methodist Church, Statesboro, Georgia, 1:00 p.m. Birth date: October 6, 1926. Death date: June 02, 2008.

Awards add 4 new partners and expand the scope of the Georgia communities documented in the Digital Library of Georgia.

The Digital Library of Georgia (DLG) announced today the 6 recipients of its 10th set of digitization service awards. Among the awardees are four new partners. Awardee projects include documentation of the Augusta Jewish community and Evans County African American genealogical materials.

The GALILEO-funded program increases the diversity of contributors to the DLG and of its content. The Augusta Jewish Museum, the Evans County African American Archive Museum, the Habersham County Historical Society, and the Sugar Hill Historic Preservation Society are all new partners. Through the awards, the DLG’s coverage of Evans and Habersham counties, the Savannah civil rights movement, and Jewish and African American life will grow. Rural telecommunications and the 20th-century growth of the North Georgia communities of Sugar Hill and Smyrna round out the awards.

The recipients and their projects include:

Augusta Jewish Museum (Augusta, Ga.)

Digitization, description, hosting, and preservation of the 200-year history of Jewish life in the Greater Augusta, Georgia region. This content reflects cultural, political, and social situations impacting Jews living in Georgia.

Evans County African American Archive Museum (Claxton, Ga.)

Digitization, description, hosting, and preservation of African American funeral programs, primarily from Evans county, dating from the early 1960s to the present.

Habersham County Historical Society (Cornelia, Ga.)

Digitization, description, hosting, and preservation of the archives of the independently-owned Standard Telephone Company. Headquartered in Cornelia, it provided telephone service to rural northeast Georgians.

Smyrna Public Library (Smyrna, Ga.)

Digitization and hosting of the 1953 Smyrna Better Home Town Scrapbook. In the 1950s, Georgia Power sponsored the Better HomeTown Contest to boost economic development. Communities’ scrapbooks highlighted what towns considered to be their best attributes.

Sugar Hill Historic Preservation Society (Sugar Hill, Ga.)

Digitization and description of the Sugar Hill City Council Records Collection of city council minutes, ordinances, resolutions, communications, economic studies, and other information from the city’s incorporation in 1939 through June 1992.

Walter J. Brown Media Archives and Peabody Awards Collection (Athens, Ga.)

Enhanced (time-stamped) access to interviews with W. W. Law and other Savannah, Georgia, civil rights workers. These interviews were conducted by the late oral historian Cliff Kuhn and were shot just before Mr. Law’s death. They are the most comprehensive accounts he provided of his life and career as a civil rights activist.

More information about our partner institutions is available below:

About the Augusta Jewish Museum

The Augusta Jewish Museum and its programming chronicle the life, history, and contributions of the Jewish community in the Central Savannah River Area. The museum also educates about the Holocaust and Israel, the homeland, and the Holyland. Their website is: https://www.augustajewishmuseum.org/.

Evans County African American Archive Museum (Claxton, Ga.)

About the Habersham County Historical Society

The Habersham County Historical Society was formed on February 22, 1973, by a group of twelve citizens from Clarkesville, Cornelia, and Demorest, who met at Piedmont College, interested in starting a historical society. Since then, they have published a book on their 200-year history and are planning their fiftieth-anniversary celebration in 2023. You can find them online at: https://habershamhistoricalsociety.org/.

About the Smyrna Public Library

Smyrna Public Library is the oldest city-operated library in the state of Georgia. It is fully funded by and serves the city’s residents. The library is celebrating the 150th anniversary of its incorporation in 2022. Go to: https://www.smyrnaga.gov/your-government/departments/smyrna-public-library.

About the Sugar Hill Historic Preservation Society

The Sugar Hill Historic Preservation Society meets on the 3rd Wednesday of each month at 7 pm. All meetings are held in the History Museum Room at Sugar Hill City Hall. You can find out more at: https://cityofsugarhill.com/government/boards-commissions/historic-preservation-society/.

About the Walter J. Brown Media Archives and Peabody Awards Collection

The Walter J. Brown Media Archives & Peabody Awards Collection is home to more than 90,000 titles and 5,000,000 feet of newsfilm. It is the third-largest broadcasting archive in the country, behind only the Library of Congress and UCLA. The Archives comprise moving image and sound collections that focus on American television and radio broadcasting and Georgia’s music, folklore, and history. There are more than 50,000 television programs and more than 39,500 radio programs in the Archives, in addition to audio folk music field tapes and home movies from rural Georgia. Its mission is to preserve, protect, and provide access to the moving image and sound materials that reflect the collective memory of broadcasting and the history of the state of Georgia and its people. Learn more at libs.uga.edu/media/index.html.

About the Digital Library of Georgia

The Digital Library of Georgia is an award-winning initiative of GALILEO, Georgia’s statewide virtual library, housed at the University of Georgia Libraries. With the state’s cultural heritage organizations, the DLG shares Georgia’s history online for free through its websites. In addition, the project supports its partner organizations by offering free and low-cost services. The DLG serves as Georgia’s service hub for the Digital Public Library of America and as the home of the Georgia Newspaper Project, the state’s historic newspaper preservation project.

Visit the DLG at dlg.usg.edu.

Facebook: http://facebook.com/DigitalLibraryofGeorgia/

Twitter: @DigLibGA

Instagram: @diglibga