“Nearly 4,000 UGA students fall asleep each night in dorms built on the grounds of the torched, obliterated Linnentown neighborhood where 50 Black families once lived.” Those are the words of Alex Benoit, graduate of Oconee County High School, current Harvard student and creator of the 22-minute documentary Linnentown: Urban Renewal, White Supremacy and the University of Georgia, which explores the destruction of a thriving Black community on Baxter Street in 1962. Sponsored by the UGA Department of History and United Campus Workers of Georgia, the event is free but will accept donations to Athens Reparations Action. The film screening will be followed by a panel including Linnentown first descendants Hattie Thomas Whitehead and Christine Davis Johnson, Athens-Clarke County Commissioner Russell Edwards, Athens Reparations Action President Alys Willman and Benoit himself.
WHO: Linnentown: Urban Renewal, White Supremacy and the University of Georgia
WHEN: Monday, Aug. 15, 6 p.m.
WHERE: Ciné
HOW MUCH: Donations accepted
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