April is a special month. It not only marks warm weather and blooming flowers; April 4 is the five-year anniversary of Coming to the Table-Historic Triangle!
I still remember that fateful day when I received a letter from Coming to the Table’s national office that said my application for a Historic Triangle chapter was approved. It wasn’t until I read the letter for the second time that I noticed the date, April 4 — the same date as the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. Racing thoughts began to flood my mind.
First I thought about the racial unrest that King’s death unleashed. There were riots and destruction in cities nationwide.
I thought about how more than 50 years after his death, our nation is still grappling with racial injustices that King stood against.
I thought of Coming to the Table’s vision to fulfill King’s dream that “the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.”
I thought the longest about how our new local Coming to the Table chapter would make an impact on the Historic Triangle community.
I could not have imagined that a year later, our nation would once again be thrust into racial unrest. The 2020 murders of Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd and Breonna Taylor unleashed a national and global outcry unlike anything I have ever witnessed in my lifetime. Hundreds of Confederate statues were removed, including the one that stood in Bicentennial Park in Williamsburg.
When the Historic Triangle chapter was organized in 2019, there were 30 Coming to the Table groups. Today there are approximately 50 chapters nationwide. This demonstrates that people are ready to have civil conversations about America’s complex racial history, as well as to improve modern day race relations.
In its first five years, Coming to the Table-Historic Triangle focused on community engagement. We started by instituting programming that has grown to become annual community events. In 2020 we organized the first Greater Williamsburg National Day of Racial Healing to join communities nationwide in raising awareness about the need for bringing a diverse group of people together for collective action. Another annual event that began in 2020 is the Heal Greater Williamsburg/Heal the Nation Community Day, which gives community leaders an opportunity to participate in a forum to share what they are doing to promote healing. In 2022, the Journey to Racial Healing Ceremony was introduced to honor people who are seeking to acknowledge and heal from their family’s ties to slavery.
Along the way, we worked with Williamsburg city leaders to help create the first-ever Williamsburg Truth and Reconciliation Committee; introduced an award-winning Building a Bigger Table column; began the Table Builders Awards to recognize people and organizations that are building bridges to unite our community; and launched the nonprofit Virginia Racial Healing Institute.
Over the next five years, Coming to the Table-Historic Triangle will continue to focus on “building bigger tables,” working collaboratively with government, business, education, nonprofit and faith-based communities and offering monthly programs and annual events to facilitate discussions about local and national racial issues.
Our upcoming events include partnering with James City County on a community memorial service to celebrate the life and legacy of Col. Lafayette Jones Jr. on April 28. On April 22, Coming to the Table will be featured on the popular local radio program “Making A Difference Monday” to discuss how we are making an impact on the Historic Triangle. I hope you will tune in to FM 93.5/THE BURG at 2:30 p.m. or join our upcoming community event. There’s a seat at our “table” for you!
When we come together to build a more truthful and just community, we all win!
Laura D. Hill is the founder of Coming to the Table-Historic Triangle, which is managed by the Virginia Racial Healing Institute. Learn more about her work at comingtothetable-historictriangle.org.
