Three years ago this summer, the streets of Brooklyn, like the streets of cities all across the country, erupted in Black Lives Matter protests in response to the murder of George Floyd along with so many others at the hands of the police. As in years past, the area around Brooklyn's Central library became a gathering point for protesters. Then newly part of the Brooklyn Public Library, the Center for Brooklyn History soon undertook to create an exhibition and public history project to both document the 2020 protests and place them in the historic context of anti-racist protest in Brooklyn. The result was Brooklyn Resists, which was on view at CBH from Juneteenth through September 2021, and is still fully viewable online.
As part of Brooklyn Resists, CBH also embarked on a community collecting project, soliciting digital materials related to the 2020 protests to add to our collections. The items from this initiative are available on our Digital Collections portal under the call number prefix BRCP, and this week's Photo of the Week is one of them. This powerful image by photographer Ron Foster shows a group of raised fists in the air at a protest on July 4, 2020. Three fists in the foreground are most prominent, but it is clear they are but a few among a whole sea of additional arms, stretching into the background and nearly filling the frame. This photograph captures the strength and solidarity felt across Brooklyn during that eventful and impactful summer.
Interested in seeing more photos from CBH’s collections? Visit our online image gallery, which includes a selection of our images, or the digital collections portal at Brooklyn Public Library. We look forward to inviting you to CBH in the future to research our entire collection of images, archives, maps, and special collections. In the meantime, please visit our resources page to search our collections. Questions? Our reference staff is available to help with your research! You can reach us at cbhreference@bklynlibrary.org.
This blog post reflects the opinions of the author and does not necessarily represent the views of Brooklyn Public Library.
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