Saturday, Jun 21st , 2025
2:00 pm
$5 Friends of Mills at Staatsburgh members, $5 plus Eventbrite fee for general admission
Janeen Martin
Staatsburgh State Historic Site
75 Mills Mansion Drive Road 1
off Old Post Rd.
Staatsburg, NY 12580
(845) 889-8851
From its inception, the Dutchess County economy has been at the crossroads of great economic currents. From the earliest times of Dutch
settlement, it has operated in the economic realms of global trade right down to the smallest economic unit of the self-sufficient farm. This presentation, led by Bill Jeffway, the Executive Director of the Dutchess County Historical Society, examines how the Black community, focusing on the 19th century, engaged in all those economic levels locally. There are extremes of wealth and poverty, and a growing middle class of professionals who often worked within, or intersected with, these various levels of economic activity. Likely because of the pervasiveness of slavery even in the most rural parts of the county until its abolition in New York State in 1827, communities of color were present in both the built-up and the most remote inland rural areas.
Jeffway serves on the research committee of Celebrating the African Spirit and on the advisory committee to Vassar College's Inclusive History Initiative. A brief reception will follow the presentation.
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