Sugg House the subject of Aronos event
Author and historian Sylvia Roberts will give a discussion on Sonora’s historic Sugg House at a meeting Tuesday, Feb. 21, of the Aronos Research Club.
The public is encouraged to attend the free event, which will begin at noon at the Aronos Clubhouse, 37 Elkin St., in downtown Sonora.
Roberts is an expert on the African American pioneers in the 1849 Gold Rush. She has done extensive research on the Sugg House and the Sugg family.
The Sugg House is on the National Registry of Historic Places. The home was built in 1857 by William Sugg, who came to California as a slave and was able to buy his freedom. Originally built as a three-room brick-facade adobe house, it became necessary to construct wood frame additions to accommodate his growing family of 11 children. The home was occupied by the Sugg family for 125 years. Grandson Vernon Sugg Mcdonald, the last to live in the house, was a local businessman and active member of the community who was honored by the Chamber of Commerce in the 1970s.
Sylvia Roberts is the author of “Mining for Freedom: Black History Meets the California Gold Rush.” The book focuses on the estimated 5,000 blacks that were an early and integral part of our state’s Gold Rush. In her book she wrote, “Thousands of resourceful, resilient, resolute souls have been overlooked by mainstream history for more than one-hundred-and-fifty years.”
Roberts is a member of the Tuolumne County Genealogical Society and works with museums, archives and historical societies locally and throughout Northern California. In her efforts to broadcast the unique history that is her focus, she has also worked with the National Park Service and the Smithsonian Institution. In 2007, she founded the Mother Lode Black Heritage Foundation in Sonora, a nonprofit dedicated to the preservation and promotion of the history of California’s African American Gold Rush pioneers.
The Aronos Research Club was established in 1915.
With 30 members, the Aronos is the largest club in Yosemite District of the California Federation of Women’s Clubs and one of the few clubs that owns its clubhouse. The clubhouse originally was the First Baptist Church, built in 1902 and purchased by the Aronos Research Club in 1936.