International African-American Museum Awarded Two Million Dollars in Support by Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Slave Trade, Africa, 1899 (Sir Harry Hamilton Johnston, et. al., public domain courtesy of the New York Public Library).

Leaders of a new museum under development in United States have announced important new funding which is expected to greatly enhance African-American family history research across the globe. The two million dollar award was made by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to the International African American Museum — a new educational facility which is slated to be built in Charleston, South Carolina, where roughly half of all enslaved Africans were brought after being forcibly transported via the Transatlantic Slave Trade prior to the end of the American Civil War.

The funding is expected to support not just the creation of the IAAM Center for Family History, but to help make it “[o]ne of the crown jewels of the experience at the museum,” according to Joseph P. Riley, the longtime former mayor of Charleston and lifetime IAAM board member. “Because of this generous donation from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the center will catapult into a level of excellence that simply would not be achievable” otherwise.

During his announcement of the donation at RootsTech’s 9th family history conference in Salt Lake City, Utah, elder David A. Bednar explained that the church is supporting IAAM’s Center for Family History at this early juncture of its development because its leaders and members “value the strength that comes from learning about … families. The museum will not only educate its patrons on the important contributions of Africans who came through Gadsden’s Wharf and Charleston, it also will help all who visit to discover and connect with ancestors whose stories previously may not have been known.”

Also speaking at the Salt Lake event was Martin Luther King III, son of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The younger King noted that the collaboration between the IAAM and the church was very much in line with the efforts of his father to create a “beloved community.”

Prior to this The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and its FamilySearch International were instrumental in increasing access to African heritage records, including letters and contracts which were created immediately after the American Civil War as part of the Freedmen’s Bureau.

When its doors open on the site of the former Gadsden’s Wharf in Charleston in the year 2021, the IAAM and its family history center are expected to deliver not only a world-class museum experience, but to serve as a “memorial and site of conscience” which will help visitors better understand and appreciate “the history, sacrifices and contributions of Americans of African descent,” in a way that “contribute[s] to a more complete and honest articulation of American history.”