Frances Jones-Sneed to Speak at WCMA

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WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass.— In conjunction with "Emancipation: The Unfinished Project of Liberation"—currently on view at the Williams College Museum of Art—Frances Jones-Sneed, Ph.D., emeritus professor of history at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams, will give a talk titled "Being Black and Free: Before and after the Emancipation Proclamation in Berkshire County, Massachusetts' on Thursday, March 7.

The lecture will begin at 6 p.m. at WCMA; the galleries will remain open until 6 p.m. for those who want to visit the exhibition prior to the talk.

Dr. Jones-Sneed has dedicated her life and research to making African American history visible and readily available to the public. In particular, she is interested in sharing the stories of individuals in Massachusetts. 

Frances Jones-Sneed, Ph.D., has taught and researched local history for over thirty years. She has directed three National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) grants on African American Biography. She spearheaded a national conference on African American Biography and is co-director of the Upper Housatonic African American Heritage Trail. She was an NEH Fellow at the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute at Harvard University and is currently working on a monograph about W.E.B. Du Bois and editing the autobiography of the Rev. Samuel Harrison, a nineteenth-century African American minister from Pittsfield, Massachusetts.

"Emancipation: The Unfinished Project of Liberation," on view through July 14, presents newly commissioned and recent works by Sadie Barnette, Alfred Conteh, Maya Freelon, Hugh Hayden, Letitia Huckaby, Jeffrey Meris, and Sable Elyse Smith in a new exhibition visualizing Black freedom, agency, and the legacy of the Civil War today and beyond. The seven installations featured the exhibition— spanning sculpture, photography, and paper and textile fabrications—react to the legacy of John Quincy Adams Ward’s bronze sculpture The Freedman (1863) from the Amon Carter Museum of American Art’s collection and highlight the diversity of materials and forms in sculpture, installation, and mixed media today. 

The event will take place in the auditorium of Lawrence Hall, the building which houses WCMA. Visitors can enter through the main museum door and will need to take stairs or an elevator one flight down. There is limited parking directly outside the museum on Lawrence Hall Drive but ample parking nearby on public streets and in public lots. Refer to the map on our Visit page for other parking options.

WCMA is open Tuesday through Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is free. For more information, visit artmuseum.williams.edu.


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Williamstown Fire Committee Talks Station Project Cuts, Truck Replacement

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Prudential Committee on Wednesday signed off on more than $1 million in cost cutting measures for the planned Main Street fire station.
 
Some of the "value engineering" changes are cosmetic, while at least one pushes off a planned expense into the future.
 
The committee, which oversees the Fire District, also made plans to hold meetings over the next two Wednesdays to finalize its fiscal year 2025 budget request and other warrant articles for the May 28 annual district meeting. One of those warrant articles could include a request for a new mini rescue truck.
 
The value engineering changes to the building project originated with the district's Building Committee, which asked the Prudential Committee to review and sign off.
 
In all, the cuts approved on Wednesday are estimated to trim $1.135 million off the project's price tag.
 
The biggest ticket items included $250,000 to simplify the exterior masonry, $200,000 to eliminate a side yard shed, $150,000 to switch from a metal roof to asphalt shingles and $75,000 to "white box" certain areas on the second floor of the planned building.
 
The white boxing means the interior spaces will be built but not finished. So instead of dividing a large space into six bunk rooms and installing two restrooms on the second floor, that space will be left empty and unframed for now.
 
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