Remembering the Black Fashion Museum

Collection Will Reemerge as Part of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture

The Black Fashion Museum was founded in 1979 by Lois Alexander Lane in a Harlem brownstone. Lane was a dedicated fundraiser and curator, and managed to expand her wealth of culturally and socially significant artifacts for nearly 30 years. In 1994, the museum moved to Washington, DC where Lane eventually established it in a one hundred year old row house at 2007 Vermont Ave, NW - just around the corner from the Humanities Council. After Lane's death, her daughter Joyce Bailey sought to continue her mother's efforts to expand the organization's collection and reach, but the cache of dresses, coats, hats, and other garments designed and sewn by slaves, famed Hollywood designers, Civil Rights leaders, and First Ladies' seamstresses, had begun to outgrow the Vermont Avenue facility. In 2007 Bailey donated the important collection of Americana to the new Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.

This episode of Humanities Salon honors Anne Lowe, a noted African American clothing designer who created Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy's iconic wedding dress in 1953. It was filmed at the Black Fashion Museum in 2002, and includes several notable panelists including Lowe's great granddaughter and Washington Post fashion editor Robin Ghivan. Ghivan wrote an outstanding article on the Black Fashion Museum and its important, yet overlooked, collection in 2007, as it was moved to the secure and climate-controlled facilities of the Smithsonian.

The National Museum of African American History and culture is scheduled to open in 2015.

Blast from the Past: The Humanities Council's TV Programs

Humanities Profiled, Humanities Salon, and DC Humanities Return on HCTV

Miller Reads from Fathering Words at the Arts Club
of Washington, DC.

Not long ago, the Humanities Council produced several regular television series for the District's public access cable network, DCTV. The footage from those programs is now part of the DC Digital Museum collection and is making a comeback on HCTV, the Humanities Council's Youtube channel. The first of these programs to be uploaded was an episode of Humanities Salon featuring E. Ethelbert Miller at the Arts Club of Washington, DC. The program features Miller reading from his memoir, Fathering Words, and fielding interview questions from his friend and former wife Michelle Greene.

VHS, DVCAM, and SVHS cassettes in the DC Digital
Museum Collection.

The Humanities Council's longest running television program was Humanities Profiled. Guests of that series included notable DC humanities figures, past Humanities Council grantees, and major political decision-makers. HP episodes featuring grantees Nick Hollis and Beverly Lindsay-Johnson, and humanities luminaries Marcus Raskin and Andy Shallal are coming soon to HCTV. Hollis discussed the James Wormley recognition project which sought to recognize an often overlooked DC historic figure, and Lindsay-Johnson answered questions on her then-forthcoming documentary Teenarama.

Many of these old episodes were archived on media that has either, not stood the test of time, or is difficult to digitize. As a result, some of the videos have significant color bleed, blurriness, and other imperfections. The sound, however, is flawless in most, so we will go ahead and post what we have and continue working to recover the footage in its highest quality. Until then, stay tuned to HCTV, and comment on our new-old television shows on the channel, the blog, or both!