Stoutsburg Sourland African American Museum

Museum Trustee (Technology Chair)

Webmaster

GIS Analyst

Skillman, NJ

January 2015 to Present

I joined the board of trustees for the Stoutsburg Sourland African American Museum (SSAAM) at its inception, in January, 2015.

One of the primary goals of the SSAAM is the restoration of the Mt. Zion AME Church, future home of the museum, located on Hollow Rd in Montgomery NJ. The organization also recognizes and furthers the story of African Americans in the Sourland region, and their important contributions.

As the Technology Chairperson for the organization, I have created maps, digital mapping applications, and a new website, as well as updates to social media platforms.

Given the troubled and somewhat regressive times we live in, I consider the work I do for the SSAAM to be some of my most important. To learn more about the goals and mission of the organization please click here.

Period Map and Information Board

My first GIS project for the SSAAM was the production of a large map and companion information panel, that highlight the African American people and places of the greater Sourland region.

Mapping Application for African American Places, Culture & History

The Mapping Application for African American Places, Culture and History, created through ESRI"s Story Map development platform, allows points of interest to be viewed in a web map, where users can obtain information about the sites. This information includes geographic locations & data, categories, short descriptions, and live website links for more detailed site information, and Google Map directions. The application also includes tools to make site finding easy and quick.

Nearly 300 hundred sites have been verified, which lie mostly along the target region of the I95 corridor, from Portland, ME to Richmond VA. Dozens of websites from organizations and government agencies were utilized to gather this data. The sites have been organized into major categories, including historic sites, cemeteries and churches, as well as museums, memorials, monuments, and sites of cultural and academic importance.

The application was awarded 2nd place in the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection’s 2018 Mapping Contest, for Best Web Mapping Application.

To access the application, click here.

Museum/Organization Website

The new Stoutsburg Sourland African American Museum's website, created in 2018, was my first foray into website creation and maintenance. It features the history and culture of African Americans in the Sourland region, as well as updates for the museum and the organizations many activities and events. It also features maps I created, specifically for the website.

To access the website click here.

"Geography of a Lynching: The Crooked Death Zachariah Walker"

In the spring of 2021, I completed a digital mapping project for the Stoutsburg Sourland African American Museum, an ESRI Story Map, titled “Geography of a Lynching: The Crooked Death of Zachariah Walker”.

It was created as part of SSAAM’s educational programming, and chronicles not only the tragic events of 1911 in Coatesville Pennsylvania, but also the circumstances that led up to them, including Jim Crow, the Great Migration, and Pennsylvania and Coatesville industrial history. It also includes a section on the aftermath of the lynching, in which no justice was served.

The project also includes a large poster-sized map

The project is an example of the intersection of geography and history in a GIS environment, and it is one of the biggest and most important mapping projects of my career