From West Virginia to Jimi Hendrix: Black Miners at Beaver Hill with Pamela Athearn Filbert.

The June 7th First Tuesday Talk will take place from 6:00 PM – 7:00 PM both in person at the CHM and online via Zoom. Doors to the museum will open from 5:30 PM – 7:30 PM for visitors to view the exhibits and visit the museum store if desired.

*Registration is offered both in person at the museum and online through this event page. Please register at your earliest convenience.

• CHM Member: Whether participating online on in person, if you are a current CHM member, this program is free to you and you may enter the coupon code “FTTmember” for your free price.
• Non-Member In-Person: If you are a non-member joining us in person, the price is $7.
• Non-Member Online: If you are a non-member joining us online, the cost is $5 and you may enter the coupon code “FTTonline” for the online price.

Please register each attendee separately.

Pamela Athearn Filbert grew up in Portland as a proud 5th generation Oregonian, and graduated from the University of Oregon, where she minored in history. She has engaged in a wide variety of paid and volunteer work since then, and has contributed to the blog of American Ancestors/New England Historic Genealogical Society in Boston since 2017. Four years ago she spent Mother’s Day weekend helping to move her newly-graduated son to the Coos Bay Area for his first job after college, and she enjoyed visiting several times while he was a resident. Pamela began doing research for Oregon Black Pioneers in 2020, after the organization was featured in her local newspaper during Black History Month. The Beaver Hill Miners project was the second she undertook, and she is currently collaborating on a survey of African American churches in Oregon. 

Census records from 1890 and 1900 indicate that Oregon’s total Black population stood between 1100 and 1200 people. But in the middle of that decade, the state’s Black population would have shown a significant increase due to the Beaver Hill Mine in Coos County. Black miners and their families arrived from many locations throughout the country, working and living alongside White miners and their families. They constituted approximately 20% of the total population at Beaver Hill…and nearly the same percentage of the state’s entire Black population. This talk will explore where the miners came from, the reception they received in Coos County, and what their lives were like underground and in the town of Beaver Hill. It will also explore the backstories and the continuing stories of the Black miners and family members who could be individually identified.

*Membership status and attendance in person/online will be verified. Once you have completed registration you will be sent a confirmation email with the Zoom link. If attending in person, face masks are welcome but not required.

If you’d like to learn more about our membership program and/or become a member, please click here: CHM Membership

All events subject to change.