Click here to register in advance for this Zoom talk. Details here:
“Lincoln to mark Juneteenth with ringing of bells, author talk”
“The Terrible Power of the Constitution’s Three-Fifths Clause” is the title of a lecture by historian Richard Bell, Ph.D. on Tuesday, June 22 from 7–9 p.m. via Zoom (click here for the link to register). Far more insidious than is commonly understood, the Three-Fifths Clause wove slaveholder power into the fabric of each of all three branches of government, shaping every aspect of federal policy regarding slavery for decades to come. Watch for free or make a donation to Historic New England. Co-sponsored by the Lincoln Anti-Racism and Diversity Task Force, the Lincoln Historical Society, and Robbins House in Concord.
A four-session hands-on introduction to the farm for kids age 5–7 starting on Wednesday, Aug. 4 from 10:30–11:30 a.m. The three other sessions are at the same time on August 11, 18 and 25. Click here for more information and online registration.
Embracing Change, a Lincoln nonprofit, is offering a four-session program focused on helping parents transition into or through the empty-nest period with ease and fun. They give parents the opportunity to connect, design, and redefine this new stage of life. Sessions are on four consecutive Wednesdays from 1–3 p.m. at the Pierce House. The program is free but the material fee is $40. Limit of 16 people due to the pandemic. Click here to register.
Wednesday, Sept. 8: “Navigating Transitions through Productive Communication with Adult Children”
Dr. Teresa Simonelli will discuss how we can positively address concerns, emotions and transitions by using productive communication skills with young adults. A “welcome tea” will precede the session from 1–1:30 p.m.
Wednesday, Sept. 15: “What’s Next: Finding Your Purpose, Designing Your Journey”
As parents adapt and adjust to life without children at home, they may reassess their personal satisfaction with how they spend their time and contemplate what might be next. You’ll leave with goals and a map to chart your own path and personal journey.
Wednesday, Sept. 22: “Expanding Your Horizons: Delving into New Activities and Careers”
Attendees will explore activities and careers and then hear from several guests who have changed careers and explored new interests after their children left home.
Wednesday, Sept. 29: “Ready, Set, Go and It’s All About Relationships”
Attendees will share tips on how to care for aging parents while taking care of themselves and their families, and will leave prepared for that sometimes awkward question, “So what are you doing now?” as career and leadership coach Patty Levy jump-starts each participant’s own distinctive elevator pitch.
On Thursday, Sept. 23 from 7–9 p.m., the RJA presents a screening of Professor Jill Lepore’s video talk about King Philip’s War in Massachusetts. The Zoom link can be found on the First Parish in Lincoln’s Racial Justice Advocates web page
Following the lead of the United Nations, earlier this year the Sudbury Select Board voted to proclaim March 2021 as “Shadow Pandemic Awareness Month.” Over the past 18 months, pandemic conditions have created significant additional concerns for survivors of abuse. While a number of media outlets have noted the increased risk of physical harm, abuse survivors’ experiences with emotional and financial abuse have received less attention.
Join the Sudbury-Wayland-Lincoln Domestic Violence Roundtable via Zoom on Tuesday, Oct. 12 at 3 p.m. to learn more about domestic abuse and ways we can offer help and support to people here in our community. Registration is required and can be completed at www.domesticviolenceroundtable.org.
Following a short video, program participants will talk more about the subtle and not-so-subtle signs of abuse and how we as a community might respond. In addition to highlighting things that individuals can do to raise awareness and support survivors, Roundtable members will talk about the different initiatives and opportunities – ranging from one-time efforts to ongoing projects – that community members can get involved with. Attendees are welcome to participate in the conversation or come to listen.
We especially encourage people connected with local civic, religious, business, political, education-related and social organizations to come and learn more about how your group might get involved with the Roundtable’s efforts to reach out to survivors and prevent abuse in our community.
All are invited to join a Zoom panel presentation led by Lincoln School faculty member Claudia Fox-Tree to explore what we can do to challenge racism against Indigenous peoples. Missing information and misinformation about the First Nations people of the Americas makes it challenging to understand current Indigenous challenges. The journey of un-erasing Indigenous voices and learning what we were not taught, or mis-taught, starts with accurate information about the past and present. It continues by having conversations with families, friends, community members, and our own children. Join Claudia and her allies on a panel as they discuss how United States history is connected to present Indigenous cultural erasure and genocide, and what we can do to challenge racism against Indigenous people.
Click here for the Zoom link. The program is sponsored by the Lincoln METCO Parent’s Group.
Lincoln School is on the territory of the Pawtucket and Massa-adchu-es-et.
Ray Anthony Shepard — educator, writer and First Parish in Lincoln member — will speak via Zoom on “How Do We Talk About Race in a Time of Critical Race Theory Pushback?” on Thursday, Oct. 21 at 7 p.m. Following his talk, he’ll participate in a wide-ranging discussion of his work as historian and interpreter of African-American experiences in his award-winning 2017 Now or Never! 54th Massachusetts Infantry’s War to End Slavery and his 2021 poetic retelling for young readers of the story of a woman enslaved by the Washington family in Runaway: The Daring Escape of Ona Judge. “I write for readers who understand the universal need for fairness” and “to tell a fuller story of our country’s history,” Ray explains on his web page.
The session will also provide room for reflection on themes related to Ray’s work, as they appear in the film Harriet and in books included in our suggested-reading syllabus: Erica Armstrong Dunbar’s Never Caught: The Washington’s’ Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave Ona Judge; biographies of Harriet Tubman by Kate Clifford Larson and others; William Still’s The Underground Railroad Records; and fictional recreations of the experience of fugitives from bondage by Colson Whitehead and Ta-Nehisi Coates.
To get the link to this Zoom meeting, go to fplincoln.org/calendar and click on October 21 and Ray’s talk. Hosted by FPL’s Racial Justice Journey Steering Committee.
Last spring, we began to explore Lincoln’s past as a town that included enslaved people with a talk by Elise Lemire (co-sponsored by the Lincoln Historical Society and the Bemis Free Lecture Series) on “Slavery in Lincoln, Massachusetts: Reckoning with Our Past, Planning for a More Honest and Inclusive Future” (click here to watch video). We’ll dig deeper on Thursday, Oct. 28 at 7 p.m. with a talk on “Entangled Lives, Black and White: Lincoln and Its African American Residents in the 18th Century” by LHS board member Donald Hafner, a retired vice provost and professor of political science at Boston College. Click here for the Zoom link (meeting ID: 936 3276 0035, passcode: 177417).
The event is co-sponsored by the First Parish in Lincoln’s Racial Justice Journey, which began this fall with a focus on national, local, and church history and the ways in which that history has involved us in questions of race. The aim is to offer access to a variety of sources of information and perspectives that will let participants reconsider these questions together, in preparation for the next stages of the journey, focused on issues (winter) and action (spring). Every Thursday evening at 7 p.m. this fall, there will be Zoom meetings with talks, documentaries, book discussions, or movies. Field trips are also offered as part of the program. Everyone is invited. To learn more, contact Mary Helen Lorenz at mhelen808385@gmail.com.
Holschuh is a resident of Wantastegok (Brattleboro, Vt.) and an independent historic and cultural researcher. He has served on the Vermont Commission on Native American Affairs and is a public liaison and tribal historic preservation officer for the Elnu Abenaki Tribe, members of the contemporary Indigenous community in Vermont. Rich is founder and director of the Atowi Project. His work draws on indigenous history, linguistics, geography, and culture to share beneficial ways of seeing and being in relationship with place.
The Lincoln Land Conservation Trust invites everyone to attend a Zoom meeting with state Sen. Mike Barrett on Monday, Nov. 15 at 7 p.m. In “We Got a Climate Bill for Massachusetts. Now What?” he’ll talk about the far-reaching climate bill that became law in Massachusetts this spring, what needs to be done to make sure it is fully implemented, and what concerned citizens in Lincoln can do to help. There will be time for Q&A. Click here to register for the Zoom link.
The LLCT’s mission includes helping Lincolnites learn more about climate change and what they can do about it. This presentation is co-sponsored by the First Parish in Lincoln Green Committee, St. Anne’s Climate Justice Ministry, and Lincoln Mothers Out Front.
At a MetroWest Climate Solutions panel discussion via Zoom on Tuesday, Nov. 16 at 7 p.m., three local residents will share their personal experiences on creating more climate-efficient homes efforts that extend well beyond adding basic insulation and programmable thermostats. Speakers include Bill Churchill of Lincoln, Sarah Maas Scheuplein of Weston, and Roger Wiegand of Wayland. Register at tinyurl.com/Retrofit2021.
MetroWest Climate Solutions is a growing partnership between First Parish in Wayland, First Parish Church in Weston, First Parish in Lincoln, the Congregational Church of Weston, Sustainable Weston Action Group, and other communities and individuals. Our mission is to share strategies for moving towards a low- and no-carbon-based society and economy and to suggest activities that enable individuals to help bring about solutions.
The Lincoln METCO Parent Board will host “Talking to Kids About Stereotypes and Invisibility of Indigenous Native Americans,” the second Diversity and Dialogue event honoring Native American Heritage Month on Wednesday, Nov. 17 from 6–7:30 p.m. Missing information and misinformation about the First Nations people of the Americas has made stereotypes hyper-visible and truths invisible. The journey of un-erasing Indigenous voices and learning what we were not taught or mistaught starts with accurate information. It continues by having conversations with families, friends, community members, and our children. Understanding tribal land acknowledgements is a next step in making Indigenous voices visible. Join Lincoln School teacher Claudia Fox Tree as she confronts “invisibility” and implicit bias, while focusing on how to engage children through books, videos, and conversations. A resource list with books and links to videos and articles will be provided. Click here to join the Zoom meeting (passcode: 994150).
The American Chestnut Foundation’s lead volunteer in Lincoln, Mark Meehl, will discuss the history of this tree and efforts to preserve its genetic diversity in town at a Conservation Department event on Thursday, Jan. 6 at 8 a.m. In this slide talk, he’ll share photos and videos of TACF’s current efforts and goals at the Flint Fields and Umbrello land. After the presentation you’ll hear updates from our Conservation Department and Lincoln Land Conservation Trust. Click here for the Zoom link (meeting ID: 913 6669 9916; passcode: 065122). Email conservation@lincolntown.org with any questions.
The First Parish Lincoln (FPL) Racial Justice Journey continues on Thursday, Jan. 6 from 7–9 p.m. with a Zoom screening of the PBS documentary “The Long Shadow,” which offers a summary of racism in America from its beginnings to recent times. Emmy Award- winning director Frances Causey traces her family’s legacy of plantation-owning in the South and continues into the 20th century. Click here to join the screening via Zoom (meeting ID: 987 9477 5010, passcode: 541766).
Lincoln’s GRALTA Foundation is co-sponsoring “Hope in the Midst of Calamity: A View from Palestine,” an online presentation by Bethlehem University professor and Palestine Museum of Natural History founder Mazin Qumsiyeh, on Tuesday, Jan. 11 at 7 p.m. The event is hosted by the Community Church of Boston and co-sponsored by Muslims for Progressive Values and Jewish Voice for Peace. Qumsiyeh, a U.S. citizen, lives in Bethlehem and is an internationally known voice for Palestinian science and rights. He is co-founder of the Palestine Institute for Biodiversity and Sustainability. Click here to join the Zoom meeting (meeting ID: 895 5257 5898, password: 246499).
How did Boston’s western suburbs become the largely white and affluent communities they are today? Lily Geismer, Associate Professor of History at Claremont McKenna College, examines the results of post-war federal policies and local suburbanization and their impacts on race and class in residential patterns in Lincoln and surrounding towns. Geismer is author of Don’t Blame Us: Suburban Liberals and the Transformation of the Democratic Party and Left Behind: The Democrats’ Failed Attempt to Solve Inequality. Elise Lemire, author of Black Walden, writes in the introduction to Don’t Blame Us: “This is local history at its finest, both particular in its questions and far reaching with its answers. I will never see my hometown of Lincoln, Massachusetts, in quite the same way again.”
Co-sponsored by First Parish Lincoln’s Racial Justice Advocates, Lincoln WIDE (Welcome, Inclusion, Diversity, Equity), an organization of Lincoln residents, and the Lincoln Historical Society. Click here for the Zoom link (meeting ID: 943 6533 7243, passcode: 392036)
“Undesign the Redline” with Braden Crooks will be presented via Zoom on Thursday, Feb. 3 at 7 p.m. “Redlining” is a shorthand reference to maps that create racial boundaries that define neighborhoods and are used in discriminatory ways to determine ownership and access to resources and services. How has redlining shaped residential patterns in greater Boston, and how does Boston’s history of redlining continue to impact our lives? An interactive exhibit, “Undesign the Redline” connects the deliberate and systematic racial housing segregation of the 1930s to political and social issues of today. Hosted by the First Parish in Lincoln and co-sponsored by the Lincoln Public Library. Click here for Zoom information.