Fort Crailo - Pinkster Event

Coming up on Saturday 22 April 2017 the Fort Crailo Historic Site in Rensselaer will hold a Pinkster celebration. Details for this event are cut from the Albany.org website.


Pinkster
April 22, 2017
Address: 9 1/2 Riverside Avenue, Rensselaer, NY 12144
Times: 11:00 am - 4:00 pm
Admission: free (a small fee applies for participation in the instrument making workshop)
Contact: Sam Huntington
Phone: 518.463.8738


Crailo State Historic Site will host a Pinkster celebration featuring the performance and education group, The Children of Dahomey. Once a Dutch holiday commemorating Pentecost, Pinkster became a distinctly African American holiday in the Hudson River Valley during the colonial era. 

During the 17th and 18th centuries, enslaved and free African Americans transformed Pinkster from a Dutch religious observance into a spring festival and a celebration of African cultural traditions. All along the Hudson River and on Albany’s “Pinkster Hill” (the current site of the NYS Capitol), enslaved African Americans reunited with family and friends and celebrated Pinkster with storytelling, food, music, and dance. 

Other Pinkster traditions, like the selection of the Pinkster King, created opportunities for enslaved African Americans to honor respected members of the community and to subtly mock their white enslavers. Festivities include presentations and demonstrations by The Children of Dahomey, an educational and performance group specializing in the historical experiences of enslaved Africans and African-Americans in colonial New York. 

Visitors can participate in The Children of Dahomey’s traditional Pinkster dances and theatrical demonstrations, take part in an instrument-making workshop, and listen in on a storytelling session. In Crailo’s cellar kitchen, culinary historian and hearth cooking specialist Lavada Nahon will be preparing food over the open hearth and interpreting historic African and African-American foodways. 

Other family-friendly activities will include crafts, games, music, and refreshments. The museum will be open for self-guided tours of the historic rooms and exhibits, including the featured exhibit A Dishonorable Trade: Human Trafficking in the Dutch Atlantic World, currently on display in the upstairs galleries.