The Newport Historical Society has named Simmons Center Adjunct Lecturer in Slavery and Justice Dr. Akeia de Barros Gomes, Native Newport scholar and curator, to spearhead the development of a new center for Black History, set to open at the Wanton-Lyman-Hazard House. The appointment marks a significant step in the organization’s efforts to highlight Newport’s diverse historical narrative.
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Ruth J. Simmons Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice
Akeia de Barros Gomes
Adjunct Lecturer in Slavery and Justice; Director, Edward W. Kane and Martha J. Wallace Center for Black History at the Wanton-Lyman-Hazard House
Biography
Akeia de Barros Gomes, Ph.D., is the Director of the Edward W. Kane and Martha J. Wallace Center for Black History at the Wanton-Lyman-Hazard House, Newport Historical Society. She is a Visiting Scholar & Adjunct Lecturer at The Ruth J. Simmons Center for Slavery and Justice, Brown University. At Mystic Seaport Museum she served as Senior Curator of Maritime Social Histories, Vice Pres. American Institute for Maritime Studies, and Dir. of Munson Institute. As an anthropologist and archaeologist her research has been extensive on many continents.
Her recent exhibition, Entwined: Freedom, Sovereignty and the Sea is a multi-year Mellon Foundation-funded project that recovers the history of the founding and development of the Dawnland (New England) through Indigenous, African, and African-descended maritime perspectives. This project is a cooperative effort with individuals in Dawnland Indigenous, African, and African-descended communities. Akeia is responsible for strategic vision and intellectual thought leadership to Mystic Seaport Museum's Library, Research, Curatorial and Exhibitions departments by overseeing professionals dedicated to advancing the Museum’s academic presence in maritime studies. She also leads development of maritime education as well as sharing findings and stories with museum visitors through exhibitions and programming. Akeia taught as professor of American Studies and Professor of Psychology and Human Development at Wheelock College from 2008 to 2017.
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Newport This Week
Resurrecting a Historic House and Long-Neglected Black History
The Newport Historical Society (NHS) announced a $4.5 million capital campaign to restore Newport’s oldest colonial home and convert it to a museum devoted to the region’s Black history. At an unveiling of plans for the 1697 Wanton-Lyman-Hazard House, NHS board President Douglas Newhouse hailed the conversion as a project to share the history of African Americans in Newport that has gone untold for the most part. “No other place in New England or perhaps the whole country will tell this history the way we will here at this house,” he said as he made note of Newport being a hub of the slave trade from colonial times to the early 19th century.
Akeia de Barros Gomes, Simmons Center Adjunct Lecturer in Slavery and Justice, grew up in Newport and attended the city’s public schools. She said she is pleased that generations of advocates would have their efforts rewarded with the conversion of the house to a museum of Black history. A member of the NHS board, Gomes has consulted on the Wanton Lyman-Hazard House project.
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Akeia de Barros Gomes, Simmons Center Adjunct Lecturer in Slavery and Justice, grew up in Newport and attended the city’s public schools. She said she is pleased that generations of advocates would have their efforts rewarded with the conversion of the house to a museum of Black history. A member of the NHS board, Gomes has consulted on the Wanton Lyman-Hazard House project.
Connecticut Public Radio
A CT museum exhibit aims to tell stories of the sea through Indigenous and Black perspectives
“Wail on Whalers, a Portrait of Amos Haskins” by Felandus Thames, an “homage to escaped enslaved people who found autonomy in whaling,” is comprised of hairbeads strung on coated wire. The piece is part of the Mystic Seaport Museum's “Entwined” exhibition, which reimagines thousands of years of maritime history through Black and Indigenous worldviews and experiences.
"Entwined" is the culminating exhibition for the Reimagining New England Histories project organized by the Simmons Center at Brown University, Williams College, and Mystic Seaport Museum and generously funded by the Just Futures Initiative of the Mellon Foundation.
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"Entwined" is the culminating exhibition for the Reimagining New England Histories project organized by the Simmons Center at Brown University, Williams College, and Mystic Seaport Museum and generously funded by the Just Futures Initiative of the Mellon Foundation.
The Atlantic Ocean connects indigenous people along the coast of what is now New England and those in the western African nations of Ghana, Togo, and Benin. Kalunga, in the Bantu language widespread across Africa. Kuhtah in Pequot.
The depths of these connections are explored at the Mystic Seaport Museum in Mystic, CT–Pequot land–during “Entwined: Freedom, Sovereignty, and the Sea,” an exhibition breaking from the Museum’s tradition of telling maritime stories through a colonizer, shipbuilder, industrial, extractive perspective. Before starting any work, “Entwined” curator Akeia de Barros Gomes, Senior Curator of Maritime Social Histories at Mystic Seaport Museum and Simmons Center Visiting Scholar, assembled a committee of indigenous and African descended community members to discuss what they wanted to present and how.
"Entwined" is the culminating exhibition for the Reimagining New England Histories project organized by the Simmons Center at Brown University, Williams College, and Mystic Seaport Museum and generously funded by the Just Futures Initiative of the Mellon Foundation.
Read Article
The depths of these connections are explored at the Mystic Seaport Museum in Mystic, CT–Pequot land–during “Entwined: Freedom, Sovereignty, and the Sea,” an exhibition breaking from the Museum’s tradition of telling maritime stories through a colonizer, shipbuilder, industrial, extractive perspective. Before starting any work, “Entwined” curator Akeia de Barros Gomes, Senior Curator of Maritime Social Histories at Mystic Seaport Museum and Simmons Center Visiting Scholar, assembled a committee of indigenous and African descended community members to discuss what they wanted to present and how.
"Entwined" is the culminating exhibition for the Reimagining New England Histories project organized by the Simmons Center at Brown University, Williams College, and Mystic Seaport Museum and generously funded by the Just Futures Initiative of the Mellon Foundation.
Indigenous and Black people tell their own seafaring stories at Mystic Seaport Museum.
"Entwined" is the culminating exhibition for the Reimagining New England Histories project organized by the Simmons Center at Brown University, Williams College, and Mystic Seaport Museum and generously funded by the Just Futures Initiative of the Mellon Foundation.
Read Article
"Entwined" is the culminating exhibition for the Reimagining New England Histories project organized by the Simmons Center at Brown University, Williams College, and Mystic Seaport Museum and generously funded by the Just Futures Initiative of the Mellon Foundation.