CANADIAN FEDERATION OF UNIVERSITY WOMEN
********************
Members of CFUW Orillia will honour Black History Month by hosting renowned author, archeologist, and historian, Karolyn Smardz Frost as the guest speaker at their meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 25.
Smardz Frost explores North America's rich African American and African Canadian heritage, and specializes in studying and teaching about the Underground Railroad in the Great Lakes basin.
She is an adjunct professor at both Acadia and Dalhousie Universities, and is a consulting historical archeologist for the Niagara Falls, New York, Underground Railroad Heritage Commission.
Smardz Frost has won several awards for previous works. Her latest novel, Steal Away Home (HarperCollins Canada 2016) tells the story of Cecelia Jane Reynolds, who at the age of 15 fled her Kentucky home by way of the Cataract House hotel at Niagara Falls NY.
Reaching Toronto, she learned to write and began a correspondence with Fanny, the woman who had once owned her body, asking the price of her own family's freedom. Thus began a 20-year correspondence between a freedom-seeker and her former mistress that has no parallel in the annals of American slavery.
A finalist for the Atlantic Book and Heritage Toronto Awards, Steal Away Home won the Speaker's Award for the Legislative Assembly of Ontario and the J.J. Talman Award for the best book in Ontario history over the past three years. The most exciting news yet is that Steal Away Home has been optioned for a five-part mini-series by Conquering Lion Pictures, which produced The Book of Negroes for television!
CFUW is a voluntary, non-profit, organization active in public affairs, working to raise the social, economic and legal status of women as well as to improve education, the environment, peace, justice, and human rights.
Each year, CFUW, currently through fund raising provided by a Homes Tour, provides scholarships to young women pursuing post-secondary education.
Membership is offered to all women who believe in our goals and value lifelong learning.
For more information, please refer to the website: cfuworillia.org
Meetings are open to members and their guests. If you are interested in attending a meeting to learn more about CFUW, please send us an email at [email protected]
********************
