INTRODUCING THE NHSL FAMILY ARCHIVES
For nearly 20 years, the Nomini Hall Slave Legacy Project has worked to research the men, women, and children of the Nomini Hall enslaved community and trace the generations that came after them.
But a family’s history is more than what we can find in a census, courthouse, deed book, or historical record.
It is also what our families remember.
Today, I am excited to introduce the NHSL Family Archives, a new space created for descendants to help preserve the stories of our families.
Each family represented in the Nomini Hall community will have its own archive where descendants can contribute:
📜 Family stories and oral histories
📷 Family photographs
🍲 Recipes and foodways
❤️ Family traditions
🎉 Reunions and family events
🔎 Genealogical research and discoveries
📝 Memories, documents, and other pieces of family history
Some of the most important parts of our history will never be found in an official record.
They are sitting in photo albums.
Written in old family Bibles.
Tucked away in boxes.
Passed from grandmother to granddaughter.
Remembered by the family historian everybody calls when they want to know, “Who was so-and-so’s mama?”
Those stories matter too.
The NHSL Family Archives are our opportunity to preserve them and connect them with the larger story of the families who descended from the people of the Nomini Hall enslaved community.
And this archive is meant to grow with us.
If you are a descendant, I want your family represented. Share the photographs. Tell us about the reunions. Send the recipes. Record the stories your grandparents told you. Share the research discoveries that finally broke through that brick wall.
Our ancestors left us the beginning of the story.
It is up to us to preserve what came next.
Explore the NHSL Family Archives and submit something from your family:
Explore the NHSL Family Archives
Our Families. Our Stories. Our Legacy.
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