Music and Words for Black History Month -- Tonight and Saturday

If you look closely at the map above, you'll see it's of a freeway system proposed in the 60's to cut through Chinatown and old Strathcona. Residents fought back to prevent the abolition of their neighbourhoods, which is why Vancouver has no freeways today. The fight also led to a small cultural renaissance: Daphne Marlett, Carole Itter and others began to track down and record the stories of residents. The original freeway would have gone right through Hogan's Alley, a largely black area near the train station that was home to the railway porters and even Jimmy Hendrix's grandmother!

Historic Hogan's Alley is being celebrated Saturday night @ the cultch in a festival of music and spoken word. The event features musician Ndidi Cascade, poets Afua Cooper, Juni Desil, and Wayde Compton, and speaker David Hilliard, who was a founder of the Black Panther Party.

Tonight at 6:30, the founders of Commodore Books, western Canada's first black literary press, will be at Spartacus Books (319 W. Hastings) for a more casual discussion to celebrate Black History Month.

Poet and novelist H Nigel Thomas, who wrote "Why We Write: Conversations with African Canadian Poets and Novelists", will be moderating the discussion.

The map is from Derek Hayes' Historical Atlas of Vancouver.