Lynching Postcards: "Token of a Great Day"

Last year's special screening of Lynching Postcards: "Token of a Great Day" was one of the most popular events we held all year. Many have asked for an encore screening so we are happy to announce that we have arranged once again to offer our supporters a special screening of the powerful and poignant award-winning documentary.

Lynching Postcards: "Token of a Great Day" offers a look at the history of lynchings in America as told through souvenir postcards featuring photographs of these brutal and sadistic murders.

From 1880 to 1968, over 6,000 African Americans were lynched at the hands of white mobs. Staged as public celebrations akin to picnics or carnivals, these lynchings were commemorated through the printing and distribution of photos and postcards that would ultimately be subverted by Black activists to expose racist violence in the U.S. to the nation’s leaders and to the rest of the world.

Lynching Postcards: "Token of a Great Day" was directed by Christine Turner and is a production of Firelight Films in association with MTV Documentary Films. The film was originally released in November, 2021.

The online screening of the 15-minute film will be followed by a conversation with two of its featured scholars:

• Dr. Terry Anne Scott, formerly the Chair of the History Department at Hood College in Frederick, is now the Director of the Institute for Common Power. She is the author of the acclaimed, “Lynching and Leisure: Race and the Transformation of Mob Violence in Texas” (2022, University of Arkansas Press). Dr. Scott recently joined the board of directors of MLMP.

• Dr. Yohuru Williams is Distinguished University Chair and Professor of History and Founding Director of the Racial Justice Initiative at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, MN. The Initiative "focuses on supporting racial justice education, facilitating research, exploring community partnerships, and encouraging dialogue and critical conversations." Dr. Williams is currently finishing a new book entitled In the Shadow of the Whipping Post: Lynching, Capital Punishment, and Jim Crow Justice in Delaware 1865-1965 which will be published by Cambridge University Press.

We are pleased to announce that Dr. Kalima Young of Towson University will moderate the post-screening discussion.
Dr. Young is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electronic Media and Film where she teaches Principles of Film and Media Production and African American Cinema. Dr. Young also created and is co-director of the University's "Invisible Architecture" initiative, "a multi-year, interdisciplinary container designed to create avenues for projects and programs that re-inscribe the voices of Black, Brown, Indigenous and immigrant populations in the narrative of Towson University’s origin story."

Lynching Postcards: "Token of a Great Day" was the recipient of many honors including an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Short-Form Series or Special, Shortlisted for Best Documentary Short Subject for the 94th (2022) Academy Awards; Nominee 82nd Peabody Award for Best Documentary.