Roswell Park Employee Group Offers Michigan Street Heritage Tours, Jazz Night on Feb. 22

Activities will highlight people, locations that figured largely in Underground Railroad, early civil-rights movement

Highlights
  • Michigan Street Heritage Tours to be offered Feb. 22 from 3 to 6 p.m.
  • Tours will highlight people, places key to abolition, civil-rights efforts
  • Jazz night to follow at Colored Musicians Club, 6-10 p.m.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — A Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center (Roswell Park) employee group has coordinated two activities highlighting the Buffalo area’s contributions toward major historical and cultural initiatives such as the Underground Railroad and Niagara Movement. In celebration of Black History Month, the African-American Roswell Employee Network (AREN) will lead Michigan Street Heritage Tours on Saturday, Feb. 22, 2014, to be followed by an evening of live jazz.

“Buffalo citizens and locations played a pivotal role in the antislavery effort, the earliest phases of the civil-rights movement, and the evolution of not only jazz music but the whole culture built around it,” says AREN Vice President Leon Hall III. “There’s an incredible legacy there that many Western New Yorkers don’t know about, one we’re eager to share with a broader audience.”

The tours will take participants to three historical venues located minutes away from the Roswell Park campus: the Michigan Street Baptist Church, the Rev. Jesse Nash House and the Colored Musicians Club Museum. The tours, to be offered in 20-minute increments between 3 p.m. and 6 p.m., will highlight the histories of the heroes of the Underground Railroad and the Niagara Movement, a civil-rights organization founded in 1905. Participants will be able to see period lighting and sidewalks and read historical storyboards regarding the history of African-Americans in Western New York.

From 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. that evening, AREN will host a live jazz night at the Colored Musicians Club, 145 Broadway St. in downtown Buffalo.

The tours cost $15 for adults and $10 for children 12 and under. The live jazz event is open to adults 21 and over, with a cover charge of $15. All proceeds will benefit the three organizations to be showcased: the Michigan Street Baptist Church, the Rev. Jesse Nash House and the Colored Musicians Club Museum.

Advance registration by Feb. 20 is encouraged. To reserve a spot and purchase tickets for both events, contact Terry Alford at 716-845-4557 or Terry.Alford@roswellpark.org; or Katherine Warthen at 716-845-3001 or Katherine.Warthen@roswellpark.org.

###

The mission of Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center is to understand, prevent and cure cancer. Founded in 1898, Roswell Park is one of the first cancer centers in the country to be named a National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center and remains the only facility with this designation in Upstate New York. The Institute is a member of the prestigious National Comprehensive Cancer Network, an alliance of the nation’s leading cancer centers; maintains affiliate sites; and is a partner in national and international collaborative programs. For more information, visit www.roswellpark.org, call 1-800-ROSWELL (1-800-767-9355) or email AskRoswell@Roswellpark.org. Follow Roswell Park on Facebook and Twitter.

Media Contact

Annie Deck-Miller, Senior Media Relations Manager
716-845-8593; annie.deck-miller@roswellpark.org