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HYRUM — February is Black History Month and you can learn more about Utah’s Black veterans at the grand opening of a traveling exhibit at the Hyrum City Museum. On KVNU’s For the People program on Wednesday, museum director Jami Van Huss told us more about it.
“We’re actually partnering with Sema Hadithi, African-American Heritage and Culture Foundation, which is a fairly new organization, it’s a few years old now but it is specific to Utah. It’s just a really wonderful organization that focuses on telling the Black story in Utah. And so, we’re partnering with them throughout February and March,” she explained.
Sema Hadithi’s executive director Robert Burch will give a special presentation in the Hyrum city council chambers – Saturday at 1p.m.and the public is invited.
Van Huss said African-Americans have a deep legacy in Utah.
“Going clear back, people don’t realize that there were people of color in Utah. Of course, there’s Native Americans, but specifically people from African descent. There were black mountain men, there were black pioneers that came with the very first company, Brigham Young’s company that came in to the Salt Lake Valley. There were black pioneers that lived in Wellsville as part of the original fort.”
Van Huss said Utah has a very rich Black history that people don’t really know about because, proportionally, there just are not many African-American people in the state.
She said that’s really what Sema Hadithi is working to correct.
“It’s a Swahili word, it means ‘to tell the story’. They have working groups, that’s how I got involved with them to begin with, as I’m on one of their working groups researching the black pioneers that came to Utah in the 19th century.”
To learn more about the programming and exhibits at the Hyrum City Museum, visit hyrumcitymuseum.org, follow them on Facebook and Instagram, or contact them by calling 435-245-0208 or email museum@hyrumcity.com.