Antoinette Harrell papers

Collection

Identifier: 608

Staff Only

Content Description

The Antoinette Harrell papers primarily document Harrell's career as a historian and activist, with collected files from her civil and social activities within New Orleans and Louisiana. The collection is extremely rich on the subjects of African American history in Louisiana and the Mississippi Delta; slavery reparations; and peonage in the South from the 1920s to the 1960s. The Harrell papers contain correspondence, news clippings, photographs, yearbooks, leaflets, genealogical material and other ephemeral items. Additionally, her papers include African American genealogy research, particularly within the southern region of the United States.

Harrell's family history is well-documented, encompassing materials about Isaac Stewart, Gwendolyn Stewart, Juanita Stewart, Michael Stewart, Clarence Harrell, Juanita Harrell, Minnie Harrell, Edgar Harrell, Josephine Harrell, Jasper Harrell Jr. and Catherine Harrell. Yearbooks include those from St. Augustine High School and St. Mary's Academy in New Orleans, Louisiana, where Harrell's family members attended those schools. Also included is a published family history, You Are My Shadow Gone But Not Forgotten: The Harrell Family History. In addition, materials from the Petty A.M.E. Church, Grant's Chapel A.M.E. Church and Fluker A.M.E. Church of Louisiana contain records from Harrell's family and church members.

Non-genealogical materials within the collection relate to Harrell's civil and social activities. The activism work of Harrell includes her establishing grassroots organizations titled Citizens for Change, and Gathering of Hearts. Her papers encompass correspondence, flyers and ephemeral materials related to Harrell's involvement in social movements for affordable energy and food equity. Of interest are photographs representing Citizens for Change (2001, 2008) and other civil activities.

Processing Information

This project was made possible in part by the Institute of Museum and Library Services award MH-245560-OMS-20.

Dates

Other: circa 1864-2017, undated

Creator

Harrell, Antoinette, 1960- (Person)

Conditions Governing Access

The Antoinette Harrell papers are open and available for research.

Biographical Note

Antoinette Harrell of Kentwood, Louisiana, is a prolific community activist who created two grassroots organizations, Citizens for Change, and Gathering of Hearts. She has become a leading historian of sharecropping and peonage research throughout the Mississippi Delta.

As a historian, Harrell uncovered cases of illegal peonage (debt slavery) in sixteen states and revealed painful stories of African Americans from the southern states of Louisiana, Mississippi, Arkansas and Florida. Some African Americans from this region were still living enslaved well into the 1960s, including some on Mississippi plantations. Although peonage was outlawed by the United States Congress in 1867, this inhumane practice of debt servitude flourished in the South nearly 100 years after the Emancipation Proclamation and the Reconstruction era. Additionally, Harrell’s research into child labor and peonage at the Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys, a reform school in Marianna, Florida, revealed horrific abuse suffered by African American boys there.

Harrell compiled over 20 years of extensive research on peonage in the southern region of the United States; her work has been highlighted in VICE and People magazines, as well as in many national and international publications and news and radio programs, including on Nightline News and ABC News. Harrell unearthed many accounts of debt servitude; she documented this discovery by producing a DVD which outlined these acts in several Mississippi counties.

Many of Harrell's contributions to African American women’s history, activism and race relations centered around her genealogy research. Harrell serves as a genealogist, historian and producer of the genealogical television program Nurturing Our Roots. She wrote several books including Department of Justice: Slavery, Involuntary Servitude and Peonage (2014), Images of America: African Americans in Tangipahoa and St. Helena Parishes (2019) and Nurturing My Family Tree: Genealogy for Children (2010).

Among Harrell's myriad accomplishments, she received an honorary degree from The People's Bible Training Institute of North America, Haiti and Cuba for her humanitarian activism work to eradicate poverty in rural communities in Louisiana and Mississippi. In 2000, Harrell founded the African American Genealogy Connection, Inc. (AAGC). The mission of the organization was to educate and encourage African Americans to participate in family research, and record and document personal histories. AAGC was governed by the executive director, president, treasurer and board members with the goals "to promote the study of genealogy; to assist members in tracing their family history; to encourage families to record and document their histories; and to publish records and data resources that can help African Americans with their research," according to the AAGC brochure.

In 2003, Harrell was appointed Honorary Assistant Attorney General for the state of Louisiana for her work in the study of genealogy. She also cofounded a genealogy camp for children in New Orleans. With her expertise in genealogy research, Harrell became the first in Louisiana to take the African-Ancestry DNA test, tracing her maternal ancestor to Niger, Africa. She traveled to Niger to meet with the Tuareg People to learn more about her maternal lineage in 2004.

Dr. Antoinette Harrell currently lives in Louisiana. Presently she is preserving oral histories and documenting prominent and influential African American families and leaders of Tangipahoa and St. Helena Parishes in Louisiana. Harrell continues her extensive peonage research, curating and documenting African American history.