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Treasure Coast nonprofits dig into local history to celebrate Black History Month Lamaur Stancil, Treasure Coast Newspapers
Much of the national attention for Black History Month goes to cities in Alabama or Oklahoma, the sites of major events in the civil rights movement.
On the Treasure Coast, residents are looking there too, but also locally as they celebrate Black pioneers who entered the swampland before it was a state, worshipped in Vero Beach and sold paintings along Old Dixie Highway throughout South Florida.
"I go to the Gomez Pioneer Cemetery in Hobe Sound and look at the years these people were born," said Martin County history enthusiast Lloyd Jones. "You see dates from the 1800s, and I try to imagine what life was like for them and I want to investigate why they came to South Florida, well before there was a tourism industry here."