Black History Month: A visit from Ida B. Wells

Marti Gobel as Ida B. Wells Thursday at UW-Parkside.

The University of Wisconsin-Parkside's celebration of Black History Month continues with an evening of living history. Beginning at 7 p.m. in Studio A of the Rita Tallent Picken Regional Center for Arts and Humanities, Milwaukee actress Marti Gobel brings early civil rights activist Ida B. Wells to life.

Born to slave parents in Mississippi during the Civil War, Wells was working as a journalist in Memphis, Tennessee, when she made a commitment to help end segregation, lynch mobs, and the destruction of African-American property in the South.

After a threat against her life, Wells migrated north and worked in Chicago where she co-wrote with Fredrick Douglass the pamphlet "The Reason Why the

Colored American is Not in the World's Columbian Exposition." The pamphlet examined why three decades after the Civil War, African Americans were still not considered equal to whites. Wells stayed in Chicago after the Exposition to promote African American rights.

Actress Marti Gobel founded Uprooted Theatre, an African-American theatre troupe, and starred in the Milwaukee Chamber Theatre's production of "Around the World in 80 Days." She also earned excellent reviews while performing the one-woman show "Neat" for Milwaukee's Renaissance Theaterworks.

Presented by the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs, the College of Arts & Sciences, the UW-Parkside Library, Black Student Union, and Friends of the Library, this performance is free and open to the public.

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ABOUT THIS STORY:

Story Status: Archived
Publish date: 2/8/2012

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