Oneonta Club Presents
9/13 Monday Meeting
September 13th (MON), 2020, 6pm - Zoom Meeting
Chaired by Tom Polansky
SPEAKERS
William Benjamin Gould IV, author of the book Diary of a Contraband: The Civil War Story of a Black Sailor, and William Benjamin Gould V. They will speak on William Benjamin Gould’s escape from slavery in September 1862 by rowing to the U.S.S Cambridge, a Union gunboat patrolling off the coast of Wilmington, North Carolina. He served in the United States Navy for the remainder of the Civil War and left a diary of his experiences. The diary is distinguished not only by its details and eloquent tone, but also by its author’s reflections on the conduct of the war, on his own military engagements, on race, on race relations in the Navy and on what African Americans might expect after the war and during Reconstruction. This presentation promises to be inspiring and thought provoking.
ENTERTAINMENT
Kayla Moffett is a concert violinist who studied music and earned degrees at USC and Yale. She has played violin in the Washington Nation Opera and St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. She is a member of the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra at the Lincoln Center and a regular attendee at the Lakes Area Music Festival in Brainerd, Minnesota. She will be playing a few pieces of Antebellum music on violin from the time William Benjamin Gould served in the United States Navy.
