Speak On It!

Join Janice and Cherekana for a conversation with Linda Morris regarding how to conduct genealogy within a family group.  Linda will share her experience researching her family history with several cousins and the benefits of researching as a group. Linda is a member of The Black Family and History Society in Phoenix, Arizona and the Afro American Historical and Genealogical Society-New Jersey Cha...

Join Janice and Cherekana as they interview author, host, and television producer, Dustin Dumas.  Dustin is an avid family historian and researcher. She learned the importance of preserving family history from her mother, LaVerne Dumas. Ms. Dumas gives presentations on conducting family research and has written extensively on her Civil War veteran ancestors, Henry Beard and Alexander Branscomb. Sh...

Join Janice and Cherekana for an interview with Taneya Koonce of Academy of Legacy Leaders.  In celebrating Women's History Month, we are highligthing the work that Taneya does in the genealogy community.  We will also discuss some of the projects she is currently working on, the 1950 Census that will be released on April 1st, and the RootsTech 2022 conference. Taneya Koonce is an enthusiastic gen...

Join Janice and Cherekana for a discussion with Karice "Ressie" Luck Brimmer as she shares from an Afrocentric viewpoint regarding the importance of history and genealogy.  Our History Matters works to bring awareness, acknowledgement, and appreciation for African American life and historic preservation in order to build more inclusive communities, formed with the mission to showcase the omitted h...

Join Janice & Cherekana for a discussion with Dr. Orville Vernon Burton and Attorney, Armand Derfner regarding their book, Justice Deferred - Race and The Supreme Court.  The first comprehensive accounting of the U.S. Supreme Court’s race-related jurisprudence, a distinguished historian and renowned civil rights lawyer scrutinize a legacy too often blighted by racial injustice. Orville Vernon ...

Damon L. Fordham shares some of the historical research he has conducted on unknown and well known African Americans in South Carolina.  From the Upstate to the Lowcountry, African Americans have had a gigantic impact on the Palmetto State. Unfortunately, their stories are often overshadowed. The research work that Damon has done and is currently doing is changing this and making a major impact on...

Join Janice Gilyard and Cherekana Feliciano for an interview with Cheryl Wills  - I Am The Voice for My Ancestors.  Cheryl will share her passion for researching her family history, the amazing legacy of the ancestors she discovered, and how this journey has impacted her life.  Her research has led to the publication of several books, making presentations at schools weekly, and television appearan...

Join Janice & Cherekana for a conversation with Dee Patterson. Dee will share uncommonly told stories of the Underground Railroad. The creativity within the escapes, the brave travels and powerful demonstrations of faith and community are captivating. Learn about the places, people and pathways that led to freedom from Dee. Dee Patterson, also known as Conductor Dee, is the CEO and Founder of...

Aunt Donsy's Trunk -  Elaine T. Jones shares the story of an old steamer trunk that used to belong to Aunt Donsy, now a coffee table in a a family member's home where the Searcy family gather after her father's funeral.  It was one of the few family posessions left from the previous generation.  Aunt Donsy's trunk became a conduit as her family pieced together the fragments of information each one...

Join hosts Janice and Cherekana of Speak on It! to celebrate 10 years of broadcasting on Research at the National Archives and Beyond with Bernice Alexander Bennett. Bernice Alexander Bennett is an award-winning author, genealogist, nationally recognized guest speaker, storyteller, and producer-host of the popular Research at the National Archives and Beyond BlogTalkRadio program. She is also the...

Join Hosts Janice and Cherekana of Speak On It! for a conversation with Flora Morris Brown on Sharing Your Family Stories. Flora Morris Brown is an author, publishing coach, and certified Guided Autobiography Facilitator and Trainer who confesses to being a reformed coffee snob and having an unhealthy love of British murder mysteries. She helps everyday people--even those insecure about their writ...

Join Janice Gilyard and Cherekana Feliciano for a conversation with Stacey Bell regarding the importance of knowing your family’s story. Every life has a story, but stories of the lives lived by Black people are not told often enough.   We should use genealogy and history to tell the stories of our families as Black people in the diaspora because their lives mattered. Stacey Bell, BS, MPA,  is cur...

Join Hosts Janice and Cherekana of Speak On It ! as they discuss Phyllis Elmore's family history. Phyllis was born in Detroit, Michigan. At the age of four, she was sent to the tiny town of Livingston, Alabama to be raised by her grandmother Lula Horn (1883-1988), who made beautiful quilts out of the clothing of her loved ones. Each strip of fabric tells the story of the wearer’s life and death. S...

Join Hosts Janice and Cherekana of Speak On It ! for a conversation with Ruth D. Hunt about honoring her enslaved Great Great Grandfather - Richard "Dick" Lewis. Ms. Hunt has been researching her great, great grandfather Richard for over 40 years. Early on, she began with the oral history passed down from her Great Aunt Okie Clark, an entrepreneur, who owned a local restaurant with her husband Ski...

Join Hosts Janice and Cherekana of Speak On It ! for a conversation with Taneya Y. Koonce and Renate Yarborough Sanders about North Carolina Genealogy. Let’s Talk North Carolina Genealogy! is a platform hosted by Renate Yarborough Sanders and Taneya Y. Koonce. Initially created in June 2020, as a one summer YouTube show to support and provide North Carolina-focused genealogical education for resea...

Join Hosts Janice and Cherekana of Speak On It ! for a conversation with Desi L. Campbell. The African American Experience is a vehicle to serve African Americans in genealogical research through various workshops, seminars that will enable them to pursue their own family history and create a lasting presentation of their findings. We encourage African Americans to have a sense of pride and dignit...

At History Before Us, we understand the importance of history to our collective humanity, and we are committed to collecting and preserving it. We are born from many years of family research and a passion for preserving the oral stories taken from the people before us who were part of certain periods of history. With careful attention to historical events came a burning desire to share the knowled...

Join hosts Janice and Cerekana of Speak On It! for a conversation with Rodney Sam about the Legacy: Marie Senegal - his African Ancestor. Marie is Rodney Sam's paternal 7th great-grandmother and the oldest known ancestor of African descent.  She was born in 1699 in Africa and was in the French colony of Louisiana by the 1720s. She is described as "Marie Senegal" and was emancipated out of slavery...

Join host Janice and Cherekana for a conversation with Warren Eugene Milteer Jr, Assistant Professor of History at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.  We will discuss his new book, Beyond Slavery’s Shadow: Free People of Color in the South. Warren is also the author of North Carolina’s Free People of Color, 1715-1885 (LSU Press, 2020), the independently published Hertford County, Nort...

Join hosts Janice and Cherekana for a conversation with author, Kathy Marshall:  Lots of Roots investigation led Kathy Marshall on another thrilling journey into her family’s tangled historical past, finding black and white ancestors she’d never known, leading to places she’d never been, and uncovering secrets that did not want to be told. The family only knew that Grandpa Austin Marshall smoked s...

Join hosts Janice and Cherekana for a conversation with Melvin J. Collier, Author, Genealogist, Presenter, and Blogger.  Melvin will share information regarding his website:  Roots Revealed and his book, 150 Years Later: Broken Ties Mended. Melvin J. Collier has been conducting historical and genealogical research for over 25 years, starting at the age of 19. He is a former civil engineer, who use...

Join Hosts Janice and Cherekana of Speak On It! for a discussion with Dr. Evelyn McDowell, chair of Rider University’s accounting department in Lawrenceville, NJ.  She co-chaired the task force who recommended the removal of the name “Van Cleve” from an 18th-century house on Rider University’s campus following the discovery that its namesake, Benjamin Van Cleve, supported slavery. Rider University...

Join Hosts Janice and Cherekana of Speak On It! with Leslie Anderson for a conversation about Stories from the 1st U.S. Colored Cavalry. The 1st U.S. Colored Cavalry included free men, freedmen, freedom-seekers, and white officers from the United States and around the world. Who were they? Where did they come from? Where did they go? And what of those who didn’t survive? Many who returned to civil...

Join Janice & Cherekana for a discussion with Command Master Chief (CMC), United States Navy, Larae Frazier Baker. CMC Baker was selected for the Command Senior Chief program and then selected for CMC in 2016. Several months later, she was chosen for CMC reporting onboard the USS Gravely (DDG 107), Norfolk, VA from 2016-2019. While assigned, she was deployed to the SIXTH Fleet AOR as the Stand...

Join Janice Gilyard and Cherekana Feliciano for a conversation with Akosua Moore and Kimberly Morgan. Akosua Moore and Kimberly Morgan were two strangers brought together through genealogical and historical research. At the center of their connection is a man named Stephen Binyard, who is Moore's ancestor and is buried in Edgerly Cemetery in Beaufort, South Carolina. The two women met in person fo...