2025 Research Update
On February 21st, 2025, The 1856 Project will hold its second Annual Research Update, during which the project's second research report will be discussed. The 1856 Project investigates the University of Maryland’s connection to the regional context of slavery. It is the local chapter of Universities Studying Slavery (USS), a multi-institutional and international consortium of colleges and universities encouraging their institutions to think about their connections to slavery and the slave trade while addressing historical and contemporary issues surrounding race and inequality in higher education. The second annual presentation of findings will provide a research update based on historical information uncovered in 2024 by The 1856 Project members, a BSOS Summer Research Initiatives participant, a Fall 2024 semester Graduate Assistant, and community historians. For more information contact: 1856umdproject@umd.edu.
February 21, 2025
In-person and Virtual via Zoom
3pm–5pm ET
Stamp Student Union, Grand Ballroom Lounge (Room 1209)
University of Maryland
Open to the public
2nd Annual Research Report
Released Feb 21, 2025
The 1856 Project is pleased to share its second research report. Amid its many highlights, the report introduces the Bowie Ancestors Project. Through the acknowledgment and reburial of four women and three men of African descent whose remains were left in the care of the University of Maryland, the Bowie Ancestors Project seeks to provide a measure of healing and closure to the contemporary community descended from those who were enslaved on the Magruder Plantation in Prince George’s County, Maryland.
The Bowie Ancestors Project is supported in part by a Mellon Foundation grant, which has allowed The 1856 Project to establish the Reparative Histories Social Justice Research Incubator.
This report is dedicated to the Bowie Ancestors.