Descendants of Black communities in Ontario's Grey County preserve history despite adversity

When Gael Jackson first visited her ancestor's home, it stirred something inside her.

"I felt the slaves," she said."I felt their spirit so strong that I had to leave."

Jackson's ancestors came to Canada in the 1850s, fleeing slavery on the Underground Railroad, a journeythateventuallyled them to Ontario's Grey County.They settled in a placethen called Negro Creek, one of several historic Black settlementsdottingthe area.

Ontario's early Black settlers oftenfound their new lives in Canada marred by racism.

"I am so proud that they were strong enough and they had faith enough to come above it," she said.

• Descendant of Black settlers in Ontario county is fed up with theft, vandalism of road sign

Jackson grew up in nearby Owen Soundandrecalls anti-Black racism was a part of her childhoodas well.

"There was a lot of prejudice going on at that time, when I was growing up," she said. "But we fought through it with humour, a lot of great stories and everything, and we survived."

Eventually, Jackson began to write those stories down. She published a book last year, Pages of My Life: Growing Up in Owen Sound. During her research, she learned her ancestors had once lived at Negro Creek.

"I was escalated," she said. "I just was escalated"

Jackson now lives in Toronto. Her large family have mostly left Grey County, so she saidit's especially important for her to preserve their legacy there.

'How are we going to respond?'

Preserving that legacy has been a life's work for Carolynn Wilson, co-founder and curator of the Sheffield Park Black History Museum.

She runs the museum with her sister Sylvia, at the site of a former campground in Clarksburg, Ont. It showcasesthe lives and contributions of the province'searly Black communities, the loyalists, soldiers, sailors, entrepreneurs and others who once lived inplaces like Negro Creek.

Recently, a sign marking Negro Creek Road was stolen. It'soften gone missing over the years, something Wilson believes highlights the need to educate the publicaboutthe area's Black history.

"It's like in our music, the minister would call something,and the people would repeat," she said. "The call is there now how are we going to respond?"

Wilson saidshe wants the sign returned permanently. And she'd like more to be done toeducate the wider communityabout Blackhistory.

"I'd like them to know and be able to name the people and the accomplishments that we've made," she said. "A lot of people do not realize."

Film explores sign thefts

Community organizer and producerBen Heywood-MacLeod is not a descendent of Black settlers,but grew up in the areaand wasn't always awareof the history.

"My entire childhood, I would pass the road sign every day," he said. "I wouldn't think too much about it. I must have asked the question growing up but it just was kind of part of the landscape."

He produced a film about the recurring sign thefts.

"Sitting in those rooms and interviewing the descendants," he said, "I really came to understand that the history I learned growing up was only one of many, and that there were many beautiful but also difficult stories that we hadn't heard."

Road sign theft 'intolerable'

For Jackson, the theft of the road sign isn't a simple act of vandalismit's a sign of something deeper.

"You know, there is still animosity out there," she said. "They're just disrespecting what my people went through. And I just feel that it's intolerable."

But whether through her book, Heywood-MacLeod's filmor the work of the Sheffield Park Black History Museum,Jackson saidshe takes comfort knowing there are peopleworking to honour thatmemory as well.

"I'm much a part of history," she said. "And I feel that it's very important that history prevails."

For more stories about the experiences of Black Canadians from anti-Black racism to success stories within the Black community check out Being Black in Canada, a CBC project Black Canadians can be proud of. You can read more stories here.