A New Year’s Resolution: Let Freedom Ring
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
- Martin Luther King, Jr.-
The Freedom Center is a few steps from the banks of the Ohio River, once the last hurdle on the road from enslavement to freedom for thousands of African Americans. We bring to life the inspiring stories of the enslaved and of the courageous men and women who helped them in their journeys to freedom, and we build on this historic legacy to move people to act to overcome oppression and injustice, wherever they exist today.
In the 21st Century we confront a tragic irony: the legendary underground network that once led people from slavery to freedom has been supplanted by an underground criminal network that today entraps and sells people into slavery. Contemporary slavery in its various forms is highly profitable, generating more than $32 billion dollars annually in illicit revenue, and by its covert nature is in many ways more difficult to deal with than the more blatant historic institution. Therefore, despite national laws and international treaties outlawing all forms of slavery, an estimated 12 to 27 million people worldwide are enslaved, including 600,000 to 800,000 who are trafficked across international borders every year. The capacity of such egregious practices to flourish is due, in part, to disparate efforts to overcome them and a lack of public awareness.
“How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.”
- Anne Frank –
In five short years, the Freedom Center has become the nexus of an engaged community, extending its work and impact nationally and globally through real and virtual networks and media. Through permanent and traveling exhibits; prominent guest lecturers; distance learning and digital media; publications; and, real and virtual outreach, we work aggressively to advance universal freedom.
In 2009, as we celebrated our 5th anniversary, we achieved a major milestone with our distance learning program. Through partnerships with Discovery Education, Safari Montage, and Promethean, we now have access to over 30 million students nationwide. Our digital education programs are available for teachers to access from secure computer servers and then integrate into their lesson plans.
In 2010, the Freedom Center has resolved to redouble its efforts to overcome the contemporary “Unfreedoms” of Racism, Injustice, Genocide, Hunger, Tyranny, and Slavery. We will begin with a new exhibit, Without Sanctuary, which conveys the history of lynching in America and those who fought to end it. The exhibit will run from January 19 to May 31 in the Skirball Gallery at the Freedom Center.
We will continue to raise awareness about contemporary slavery with the opening of our new and improved exhibition, Invisible. The exhibit is scheduled to open in June as a permanent exhibit at the Freedom Center. Future plans are to develop a traveling version of the exhibit.
“A small body of determined spirits fired by an unquenchable faith in their mission can alter the course of history.”
- Mohandas Gandhi –
Join in our New Year’s resolution and let us walk together in the footsteps of Mandela, Wiesel, Chavez, King, Lincoln, Gandhi, and the countless freedom fighters who came before us. Your support for the Freedom Center will fuel a light that alters and illuminates the 21st Century, and affirms the triumph of the human spirit against all odds.
President & CEO
