Black History

A photo from the Colored Hockey League of the Maritimes often circulates online with the claim that runaway slaves invented ice hockey in Canada. The image is real, the caption is not. Here’s why the timeline, geography, and documented history tell a more accurate and more powerful story about Black ...

African Nova Scotian journalists, clergy, and community leaders reflect on Rev. Jesse Jackson’s 2009 visit to Nova Scotia in this Yahoo News–published Canadian Press article by Lyndsay Armstrong, revisiting his time at the Black Cultural Centre for Nova Scotia and its lasting local significance. Jackson died Tuesday in Chicago at ...

Before Black History Month became a province-wide fixture in Nova Scotia, it was built through grassroots organizing, youth leadership, and public library programming. This historical account—originally shared by the Black Artists Network of Nova Scotia (BANNS / BANS)—documents the early origins of Black History Week and the community-driven efforts that ...

First published in 2000, this article by Donna Byard Sealey traces the origins of Truro’s Black community from the arrival of Black Loyalists in Nova Scotia through the growth of families, institutions, and traditions that sustained the community over generations.

From Africville to the Prairies, Donna Paris traces the Black communities Canada encouraged, exploited, and then erased. In this interview, she explains why recovering these stories isn’t about nostalgia — it’s about correcting the record.

Long before Halifax rebuilt itself after the Explosion, Dr. Clement Ligoure was already doing the work—treating the injured by lamplight from a small private hospital on North Street. He never turned anyone away. He never closed his doors. And yet, for decades, his name was missing from the city’s official ...

25 years ago on this date in Toronto I became the 1st Miss Black Canada. At age 18 no one expected this Scotian girl would take home the crown but I got the judges with my public speaking. Contestants would ask me where I was from as they were from ...

Black Scotians by iZrEAL Jones, performed at Posh Tatoes open mic in Brixton, London, England on Aug. 18, 2013. Event hosted by Adelaide Mackenzie. Filmed by Aqa Asusa Maak Ra. www.Blessedsouluk.co.uk

On Aug. 5, 2023, the historic African Nova Scotian community of Weymouth Falls is receiving the Lieutenant Governor's Community Spirit Award. Weymouth Falls was selected for the award in 2022, but the ceremony was delayed so it could happen alongside the community's biennial reunion celebrations — the first since the COVID-19 ...

An artist and Black historian says he hopes an exhibit of African Nova Scotian quilts inspires a new generation to take up “a dying craft in the Black community.” David Woods is the curator of the exhibit titled The Secret Codes, which is currently on display at the Dalhousie Art ...

The longest-running Black music radio show in Atlantic Canada recently celebrated its 25th year anniversary on the airwaves. Ryan Somers, aka DJ R$ $mooth, has been hosting $mooth Groove$ on CKDU 88.1 FM since 1998. The show, which airs every Sunday from 5pm to 8pm, broadcasts out of the Student ...

A memorial scholarship for Black students studying health professions has been established in the name of a community and health advocate who was also the first woman in Nova Scotia ordained by the African Orthodox Church. The Health Association of African Canadians (HAAC) will host a free hybrid event Saturday, ...

Halifax regional council voted unanimously Tuesday to designate the former home and clinic of the late Dr. Clement Ligoure, the province’s first Black doctor, an official heritage property. Earlier Tuesday morning, prior to the vote, a rally was held outside City Hall in support of preserving the property. The rally ...

The son of a Black military veteran from Cape Breton who died last week says his father was a “kind, selfless person who just wanted to make the world a better place.” The obituary for Lemuel Marcus Skeete said he was surrounded by family members at Ocean View Continuing Care Centre in ...

On Sunday, Rev. Wallace Smith delivered his final sermon as senior pastor of St. Thomas Baptist Church in North Preston Photo: Matthew Byard On Sunday, Rev. Wallace Smith preached his final sermon as senior pastor of St. Thomas Baptist Church in North Preston. Smith is the first and only ordained ...

A local historian says the city should preserve a home where the province’s first Black physician, Dr. Clement Ligoure, operated a clinic and helped victims of the Halifax Explosion.

On Monday, speakers at a virtual panel discussion talked about reparations and the ongoing legacy of slavery from Nova Scotian and Canadian perspectives. The event was hosted by Dalhousie University, University of King’s College, and the Black Cultural Centre for Nova Scotia and was advertised as a pre-conference event for ...

Activists said Devet was “one of the truest allies” and gave voice to the voiceless in the Black community.

Wanda Thomas (not to be confused with Senator Wanda Thomas Bernard) said she had never heard of the African Nova Scotian flag. It wasn’t until her grandson had coloured a paper version of the flag as part of an activity through his school’s African Nova Scotian student support worker program ...

“Twenty-five years ago the Honourable Jean Augustine [the first African-Canadian woman to be elected to as a Member of Parliament] put forward a motion in the House of Commons to have February designated Black History Month. And at the same time, there were lobby efforts being made to have Emancipation ...