Event Information

Date & Time
Thursday, Feb. 20, 2025
6:00 PM - 7:30 PM
Location Heinz History Center 1212 Smallman Street
Pittsburgh PA, 15222
Ticketing $10 General Admission
$5 Members
Free for Students with a Valid ID

Register

Join the History Center’s African American Program for the 11th Annual Black History Month Lecture.

On Thursday, Feb. 20, award-winning journalist and author David Dennis Jr. will explore the remarkable life of a prominent leader and activist during the Civil Rights Movement – his father, David Dennis Sr.

Dennis Jr. will discuss his father’s role in organizing Freedom Rides, lunch counter sit-ins, and voter registration drives in the Jim Crow South, as told in his critically acclaimed book, “The Movement Made Us: A Father, a Son, and the Legacy of a Freedom Ride.”

The lecture will be followed by a Q&A session and book signing.

Admission

$10 General Admission

$5 Members

Free for Students with a Valid ID

This program will take place in the Mueller Center on the museum’s 5th floor. If you have any comments or questions, please contact [email protected].

About the Speaker

David J. Dennis Jr. is a journalist and author of the critically acclaimed memoir and oral history, “The Movement Made Us,” a Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance Bestseller, Nautilus Book Award Winner, and one of Kirkus Reviews 100 best nonfiction books of 2022.

Dennis Jr. is the recipient of the 2021 American Mosaic Journalism Prize for his 2020 cover story in Atlanta magazine, “Ahmaud Arbery Will Not Be Erased,” which sheds light on the injustice—and historical pattern leading up to—the murder of a young Black man in Georgia; as well as his piece “An Ode To The Black Women At Dillard’s,” published in Roxane Gay’s Gay Magazine. The article reflects on the solidarity and community Black women have fostered over department store counters. His work has also been featured in The Atlantic, the Washington Post and the New York Times, among other publications.

Dennis Jr. majored in English and ethnic studies at Davidson College and earned a master’s degree in journalism at Northwestern University.

An avid sports fan and sportswriter, he is currently a senior writer at Andscape (formerly The Undefeated) and panelist on ESPN’s “Around The Horn.”

About the Black History Month Lecture

The History Center’s African American Program provides a platform for scholars and others to present their work to a wide audience as part of the annual Black History Month Lecture. The program features historians, academics, film makers, curators, journalists, and literary artists who have recently published a book, film, or art to discuss their work and engage our audiences in relevant conversation. Since 2014, the Black History Month Lecture has featured nationally respected historians such as Sylviane Diouf, Tera Hunter, Claude Johnson, Leonard Moore, Sowande Mustakeem, and Nicole Fleetwood.