Community Coordination and History Committee

Mission Statement

The Committee works on projects to document and develop the knowledge and understanding of African American history in Douglas County and to incorporate that knowledge and understanding into the activities of the local NAACP and other allied organizations.  Most of the work of the Committee is accomplished through subcommittees that are formed as needed to address specific concerns and projects.

Volunteers conduct research, design projects, organize programs, participate in public events, attend meetings, and otherwise apply their skills to fulfilling the mission of the Committee.

Recent examples of work successfully performed by subcommittees

  • Organized the Lawrence/Douglas County Community Remembrance Project Coalition (CRP Coalition) that worked with the Equal Justice Initiative of Montgomery, Alabama, to document and memorialize the lynching of three men from the Kansas River Bridge on June 10, 1882, and find ways to bring reconciliation to the community that has been divided by race and end the intergenerational trauma resulting from past racial violence and oppression.

  • Designed, fabricated, and had installed an informational panel at the Lawrence Aquatic Center that tells the story of the efforts to get the first integrated swimming pool opened in Lawrence in 1969.

  • Assisted the CRP Coalition in creating and installing a marker memorializing the three men who were lynched and to foster reconciliation in the community.

  • Assisted the CRP Coalition in creating and installing a marker memorializing a young woman who was tried, convicted, and imprisoned for murder in the death of a white man who was sexually assaulting her.

Current projects being carried out by subcommittees

  • Working on a project titled Untold Stories: African American Burials in Douglas County, Kansas that was funded by the Douglas County Heritage Council to locate, document, and make a public, searchable database of all African American burials in Douglas County to preserve the memory of those individuals and bring their contribution to the history of the community from obscurity.

  • Working on a project titled Markers for African-American Burials at Potters Field that was partially funded by the Douglas County Heritage Council to mark 31 local African American individuals whose stories contribute to the understanding of Lawrence and Douglas County's history.

  • Determining ways to raise the awareness of other past examples of racial violence and oppression in the community and the helping to prevent any reoccurrence of similar actions in the future.

The Lawrence NAACP has received a $10,000 grant from the Douglas County Heritage Conservation Council to partially fund the placement of stone markers in the Potters Field section of Oak Hill Cemetery for 30 local African American individuals whose stories contribute to the understanding of Lawrence and Douglas County's history.  Their graves are currently unmarked.

The Lawrence NAACP is honored and grateful for this support from the Council.