Vivian and Don Papson honored at North Country Juneteenth event

PLATTSBURGH | The North Country's 2025 Juneteenth Committee has announced that their Colors of Freedom Community Award was presented to Don and Vivian Papson of Plattsburgh during the event's afternoon program at the John Brown Farm in North Elba on June 21. The Colors of Freedom Community Award honors an individual or organization in the North Country Region that makes a positive impact on the African American community members and actively promotes the importance of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Given annually, the award commemorates the emancipation of enslaved African Americans and promotes freedom for all people, while recognizing the contributions that enslaved African Americans made to this country. Together and individually, Don and Vivian Papson have provided the North Country with a foundation on which to build our knowledge of our community. They were the co-founders of the North Star Underground Railroad Museum in AuSable Chasm. Vivian Papson worked as a classroom teacher, research associate, community services supervisor, and speech writer in Chicago. She received many awards, including a 1980 Commendation from the Ohio House of Representatives for outstanding contributions to the quality of life of public housing residents and a 1982 election to the Ohio Humanities Council of the National Endowment for the Humanities. In the North Country, she served as a director and grants writer for the Upward Bound Program at SUNY Plattsburgh and was volunteer services supervisor at Clinton Correctional Facility. She also served a term as president of the Martin Luther King Jr. Commemoration Committee in Plattsburgh. In 1999, she founded the Red Hummingbird Foundation. Her awards also include being recognized in 2003 by the New York State Senate as a "New York Woman of Distinction." Don Papson 's activism has been the foundation from which our knowledge of our local African American heritage and history has been built on, the breadth and depth of the Champlain Line of the Underground Railroad, and the contributions of our community ancestors to the abolition of slavery. He is the founding president of the North Country Underground Railroad Historical Association, the first curator of the North Star Underground Railroad Museum, and a member of the Organization of American Historians. He co-authored, with Tom Calarco, "Secret Lives of the Underground Railroad in New York City: Sydney Howard Gay, Louis Napoleon and the Record of Fugitives (2015)." In June 1966, he marched with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in the James Meredith March Against Fear in Jackson, Miss., with members of Chicago's maverick Independent Union of Public Aid Employees. It was an experience that stayed with him and perhaps helped direct him to helping us truly understand our community. Don and Vivian Papson were also honored with the 2012 Underground Railroad Free Press Leadership Award and with the 2017 Spirit of John Brown award. The 2025 Colors of Freedom Juneteenth Celebration began with a morning bus tour of the Champlain line of the underground railroad in Keeseville and Peru. Afternoon activities were at the John Brown Farm in North Elba and included the award presentation, the People's Choir, John Brown's final speech by Bob Anderson, a presentation on the history of Juneteenth and a healing circle. The North Country Juneteenth Celebration Committee is led by Jacqueline Madison, President of the North Country Underground Railroad Historical Association. Committee members are Peter Slocum, President of the Adirondack History Center in Elizabethtown; John Brown Lives! Executive Director Martha Swan and Program Director Anna Forsman; John Brown Farm Site Manager Brendon Mills; Allison Heard, Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion and Michelle Bonati of the Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation at SUNY Plattsburgh; Annie Rochon, Professor at Paul Smith's College; Lezlie Harper, Niagara Falls Bus Tour; and Helen Nerska, Town of Peru Historian and Director at the Clinton County Historical Association.

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Vivian and Don Papson honored at North Country Juneteenth event

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