America's Black Holocaust Museum, Milwaukee

America's Black Holocaust Museum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, explores African American history and works toward reconciliation and healing. It tells that history through the story of Milwaukee and its Black residents, in exhibits online and in person on themes such as African American art, music and culture, and on eras including slavery, Reconstruction, Jim Crow, the modern civil rights movement and mass incarceration. Over the years it has sponsored films, publications, commemorations, talks, workshops, traveling exhibits, small-group discussions, a book club, curriculum development and performances, all meant to help foster racial reconciliation and healing.

Its founder

The museum was founded by James Cameron, a survivor of a lynching attempt. Born in La Crosse, Wisconsin, in 1914, he moved often with his family before they settled in Marion, Indiana, when he was 14. In 1930, at 16, he and two other African American teenagers, Thomas Shipp and Abraham Smith, were accused of murder. Soon after they were charged, a mob dragged them from their jail cells and beat them, then lynched Shipp and Smith.

Cameron was saved just after a rope had been put around his neck. He was then tried and convicted as an accessory to murder and served about five years in prison before being paroled. He went on to organize branches of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in Indiana. After retiring as a boiler engineer in Milwaukee, he founded America's Black Holocaust Museum in 1988.

Part of the African American Civil Rights Network

The museum joined the African American Civil Rights Network in 2024. Created by the African American Civil Rights Act of 2017 and coordinated by the National Park Service, the network honors the civil rights movement and the sacrifices of those who fought discrimination and segregation. It tells the movement's stories of people, places and events through a collection of public and private properties, facilities and programs.

Sources

• National Park Service, African American Civil Rights Network, "America's Black Holocaust Museum (Milwaukee, Wisconsin)." https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/america-s-black-holocaust-museum-milwaukee-wisconsin.htm
• America's Black Holocaust Museum: https://www.abhmuseum.org/milwaukee/
• African American Civil Rights Network: https://www.nps.gov/subjects/civilrights/african-american-civil-rights-network.htm