Lydia Bledsoe Hunter posted her first comment on Black Wide-Awake in December 2017. Descended from Armstrongs and Bullocks who migrated from Wilson County to Arkansas in the late 1800s, she has been one of my most active readers, liking, commenting, and sharing photos of her Exoduster family.
I was surprised and saddened this weekend to open a text message revealing the news of her passing. My deepest condolences go to her family as they mourn their tremendous loss. Mrs. Hunter always reminded me of the reach of Black Wide-Awake and its capacity to restore connections sundered more than 130 years. May she rest in peace.
What if the missing pieces of your family’s story are already waiting in an undiscovered document or your DNA?
In this upcoming episode of the African American Untold Stories Podcast, our Center for Family History (CFH) team sits down with acclaimed authors Melvin Collier, Michael Willis, Kathy Marshall, and Orice Jenkins. They will discuss how genealogy and DNA testing transform family research into powerful published narratives—from books and stage plays to documentaries and digital media.
If you value reclaiming family legacies and bringing hidden history to light, this will be a essential space to join in on the conversation. Tune in online Saturday, August 15, for the CFH podcast episode “The Importance of Telling African American Stories Through Genealogy and DNA.”
In this episode, you’ll learn:
– How to use DNA testing to uncover African American ancestry
– Ways to turn genealogical research into compelling stories
– Tools for writing or digitally publishing your family history
– Why reclaiming Black stories is essential for future generations
Your family’s legacy deserves to be told – not just discovered and not shared. Join the conversation and start writing your family’s story today.
This is an ONLINE podcast episode, as part of CFH’s African American Untold Stories Podcast.
Kudos to Samuel Joyner, who has published a volume detailing the “who, where, when” of more than seven generations of his Atkinson, Battle, and Farmer lines. These surnames that will be familiar to African-American Wilson County researchers. This 500+ page book is available via Amazon.com.
I spent last Saturday morning in a Zoom meeting with attendees of the 2025 Freeman-Hagans family reunion. I talked about the “why” of Black Wide-Awake, introduced them to the blog’s format, and, best of all, showed them how to best access its content by visiting several recent posts related to branches of their family. If you’re interested in a similar presentation for your next family gathering, please contact me at blackwideawake@gmail.com. I want all my posts to find their people!
Black Wide-Awake is for you, and the highlight of my February is always the opportunity Wilson County Public Library extends to share my work with a live audience of home folk.
This year I’ll not only be telling the story of the African-American church in Wilson County, but also offering a long-overdue workshop on African-American genealogy, offering tips for breaking down those brick walls we all struggle with.
My thanks to Holly Hoag and the good folks at Eastern Carolina Village and Farm Museum for inviting me to present as part of their lecture series, “History Speaks.” I talked to a full house about where we can find documentation of the lives of enslaved ancestors, sharing Wilson County examples that I’ve found in the course of researching for Black Wide-Awake. The audience was engaged and attentive, asked lots of questions, and shared bits of their own research experiences over the course of two hours. As a bonus, I connected with one of the principal descendant collaborators working to reclaim Ayden, North Carolina’s African-American cemetery! (More about that project soon.)
Eastern Carolina Village and Farm Museum comprises 22 historic buildings representing the architecture and rural life heritage of this region from 1840-1940.
The museum is on the former site of the Pitt County Home for the Aged and Infirm, whose residents residents farmed the land. The County Home’s original barn is still standing, and the museum relocated other buildings, including a one-room school house, a general store, etc. to the site, and two 1890s-era farm buildings donated by a local African American family. The museum has recently partnered with East Carolina University’s Joyner Library on an oral history project to conduct interviews with under-represented eastern North Carolina farm families. ECVFM is only 45 minutes down the road from Wilson, and I strongly recommend a visit.
Shout out to Regina Carter-Garcia, a local professor/poet/genealogist, who hyped the event beforehand and showed up to share insightful experience, and to my mama; Meike Darville of Scarborough House (which has become an amazing partner to Lane Street Project); and Castonoble Hooks, who traveled from Wilson County to support their homegirl!
Miles Lassiter did not live in Wilson County, but I recommend Margo Lee Williams’ book as a detailed chronicle of an African-American family history research journey and because Miles Lassiter may have been linked to Wilson County’s Hardy Lassiter through common roots in Gates County, North Carolina.
I often get queries here at Black Wide-Awake from people seeking help with finding their roots or connecting with family descended from a common ancestor. I have extensive genealogical research history, but I don’t have the bandwidth to take on projects for others. Also, I don’t live in North Carolina, where the best non-digital primary source material is located. So, I’ve created a Facebook group as a space in which to make connections with long-lost family, to post inquiries, and to share research about African-American families from Wilson County.
