Richard Allen, Black Founding Father

Richard Allen, Black Founding Father
A talk by Yvonne Studevan

아테네-클라크 카운티 도서관
Appleton Auditorium
2025 박스터 스트리트
Athens, Georgia
706 613 3650 x343

Wednesday, February 27 • 7:00 pm

Join us Wednesday, February 27 at 7:00 pm, for a talk about minister, educator and writer Richard Allen, who was born into slavery on February 14, 1760, and later converted to Methodism and bought his freedom. Fed up with the treatment of African-American parishioners at the St. George Episcopal congregation, he eventually founded the first national black church in the United States, the African Methodist Episcopal Church. He was also an activist and abolitionist whose ardent writings would inspire future visionaries. Allen helped found the Free African Society, a non-denominational religious mutual-aid society dedicated to helping the black community. A century later, scholar and NAACP founder W.E.B. Du Bois called the FAS “the first wavering step of a people toward organized social life.” Helped by his wife, Sarah, Allen also helped to hide escaped slaves, as the basement of his church was a stop on the Underground Railroad.

V. Yvonne Studevan hails from Yeadon, Pennsylvania. A graduate of Cheyney State University with a Bachelor’s of Art in Education, and Georgia State University where she received her Master’s of Education. As a retired educator, Yvonne spends her time traveling, painting, and serving on various community boards. In addition she spends time researching family history and the legacy of her great-great-great-great-grandfather, the Rt. Rev. Richard Allen. Yvonne resides in Athens with her husband, Dr. Russell Studevan.

This program is co-sponsored by the Association for The Study of African American Life and History.