Celebrate Baltimore's AFRAM, Juneteenth with Black Heritage Walking Tour
BALTIMORE -- Baltimore's AFRAM Festival gets underway on Saturday, the same day as Juneteenth.
As the proud media sponsor, WJZ is highlighting vendors and difference makers all week long leading up to the celebration.
Lou Fields has been educating people about Baltimore's Black heritage for decades.
He has a Black Heritage Walking Tour along Thames Street in Baltimore's Fells Point community.
"This is the landing spot," Fields said. "This is where Black life started in Fells Point. Shops underneath and sleeping quarters up top."
Fields, an African American History Tour Guide, has extensive knowledge of Black heritage in Baltimore.
"There was a footprint for the African American experience starting right here in fells point," he said. "Everything you're looking at was forest, trees. No roads, no buildings, no anything. America had to be built."
Fields paints an early history of Fells Point as a maritime land of opportunity.
"Many Africans came here as indentured servants first," Fields said.
Fields has guided people on this Frederick Douglass Path to Freedom walking tour for 23 years.
A young Frederick Douglass once lived here for a decade.
"In telling the story of Frederick Douglass, you begin to unravel other stories." (32.34) "You begin to learn stories about Maryland you never could have thought of before. A lot of people refer to Baltimore as the Capital of Black America in the 19th Century."
The waterfront and maritime pride ties into Fells Point's Place in Black history.
"What was happening in Fells Point was unique to Fells Point," Fields said. "They were building these ships."
Now, one of Maryland's five statues and three museums of the abolitionist sits at the end of Thames Street.
"Baltimore is the birthplace of American abolition, which led to the Underground Railroad," Fields said.
Black thinkers, builders and entertainers thrived here.
"Frederick Douglass, Billie Holliday, Isaac Myers—all were great mainstays (cut) in the Fells Point area back in the 17, 18, and 1900s."
Fields has written books and guided thousands through the years.
His tours range from an hour to five hours, by appointment through visit Baltimore.
"Generally speaking about tourists who come to Baltimore. 'Oh, we didn't know that! Baltimore did this? Baltimore did that? Baltimore had this?' So, when people have an opportunity, they begin to see Baltimore in a new light," Fields said.
Fields shows no signs of slowing down shining Baltimore's light and heritage for another generation.