Freetown Neighborhood and Its Residents are the Subjects of the July 17 Event
(Long Island, NY) Farmingdale State College sociology and anthropology professors Anjana Mebane-Cruz and Allison McGovern will be in the East Hampton neighborhood of Freetown on Sunday, July 17, to record residents’ oral histories and collect feedback from the community about restoring Fowler House, a residence once owned by a Native American family.
The event will be held at the East Hampton Historical Farm Museum, 131 North Main Street, from noon – 5 p.m. The community is invited to attend and contribute to the project.
Dr. McGovern has been doing fieldwork in and around Freetown, where Native Americans and African Americans once lived and worked alongside white laborers, doing jobs such as whaling, fishing, farming and working on the railroad.
Drs. McGovern and Mebane-Cruz have just received a SUNY Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (ODEI) grant that will support their fieldwork with descendants of former Freetown residents, and help fund the Second Annual Native American Symposium.
For more information about the event, contact Dr. McGovern at mcgovea@farmingdale.edu.
Farmingdale State College prepares students with the education, skills, and critical thinking needed to meet tomorrow’s challenges. As the largest of SUNY’s colleges of technology (with almost 8,700 students), FSC equips students with the resources and knowledge sought by today’s emerging industries. Offering bachelor and associate degrees, FSC will soon offer its first graduate program. At FSC, students learn in small, personalized classes and have abundant opportunities for applied learning—internships, clinical training, and guided research—that provide practical instruction and personal growth. Located an hour east of Manhattan, the campus offers residential halls, a lush 380-acre campus undergoing major renovation, and a highly successful NCAA Division III athletics program with modern facilities to make FSC one of the fastest-growing colleges in the region. In addition, in 2015, 2014 and 2013, FSC was listed one of the best colleges in the North and in 2013 FSC was the only SUNY school (and the only LI school) listed in the LEAST debt category in the section titled Student Debt Load at Graduation for regional colleges in the north. In 2015 UniversityPrimeTime.com again listed FSC the fifth safest college in the nation. Like us on Facebook www.facebook.com/farmingdale.
