Hopewell to host Civil War-era programs
Hopewell Furnace National Historic site will host two weekend presentations in February that revolved around the time of the Civil War.
The first will be held on Sunday, Feb. 12, and will feature author and academic Randolph Shipley Klein. His free presentation: “Lincoln’s Failures: Success is Not In Never Failing” will begin at 2 p.m. at the facility’s conference center.
Klein, who has served on the history faculties of the University of Wisconsin, Connecticut College and the University of Pennsylvania, will explore the theme “success is not in never failing, but in rising every time you fail.”
He explore whether the American people elected Lincoln in 1860, his early political career opposed to the war with Mexico and whether that is a conflict between the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.
The program is sponsored by the Friends of Hopewell Furnace.
On Saturday, Feb. 18, historian Joe Becton, a retired park ranger, will present a Black History Month program called “Music of the Underground Railroad.”
It will be held from 1 to 2 p.m. in the visitor center of Hopewell Furnace and is free and open to the public.
The deep woods around what is now Hopewell Furnace National Historic Site harbored many fugitive slaves.
Becton’s program will focus on the music and stories of those fugitives.
He will be dressed in period garb, play guitar and harmonica and play and sing 19th century freedom and popular sons such as
On Saturday, Feb. 18, historian Joe Becton, a retired park ranger, will present a Black History Month program called “Music of the Underground Railroad.”
“Oh Freedom” and “The Colored Soldier.”
In 2004, Becton researched and implemented a National network to Freedom award-winning walking tour of the Under- ground Railroad in Center City Philadelphia.
His research on Africans and the American Revolution has led to the development of a monument at Valley Forge to “Patriots of Af- rican Descent.”