Black History Month Events in NYC

Celebrate Black History Month in NYC with a full calendar of FREE and cheap tours, talks, museum exhibits and film screenings, including FREE screenings of the blockbuster Black Panther in NYC and nationwide.

Ongoing

Paley Center for the Media is screening FREE films and TV shows each weekend in February. Each weekend is a different theme, including a tribute to Ella Fitzgerald, a tribute to comedians including Redd Foxx and Richard Pryor, a Scandal marathon, and a documentary about Malcolm X.

Best of all, the screenings are FREE. See the schedule here.

In the Dugout with Jackie Robinson: An Intimate Portrait of a Baseball Legend

In 1947 Jackie Robinson made history when he joined the Brooklyn Dodgers and became the first African American in Major League Baseball. In honor of the centennial of Robinson’s birth, the exhibition features some 30 images of Robinson and the Dodgers taken for Look magazine, along with memorabilia and rare footage of the Robinson family.

There is also a Jackie Robinson Family Day on Feb. 19. Attendees can make a paper baseball to take with them, and other family-friendly activities. FREE with museum admission, 11am to 2pm.

This exhibit is through Sept. 15th at the Museum of the City of New York, on Fifth Ave. at 103rd St.

Black History Month Celebrations at The Apollo

The Apollo Theater, which is celebrateing 85 years in Harlem, is hosting special entertainment throughout February, beginning with a comedy show on Feb. 7 and ending with a live performance by Kamasi Washington and his 10-piece band, The Next Step, on Feb. 23.

Tickets start at $48.50.

United Nations Tours

Take a special tour of the Ark of Return and the victims of slavery exhibit at the United Nations throughout February. Attendees also will visit the General Assembly Hall and Security Council Chamber.

Tours leave at 2:30pm, Monday through Friday. Reservations are required for security reasons (arrive by 2pm for security). Tickets are from $22. Tour entrance is East 45th Street and First Avenue.

Black History Month events

Through Feb. 7

See Black Panther FREE on the big screen

Academy Award®-nominated “Black Panther” returns to the big screen to celebrate Black History Month for a one-week engagement, February 1-7, at 250 participating AMC Theatres locations, including five AMC Theatres in NYC.

Claim your tickets here.

Once tickets are all claimed, AMC will open up a limited waiting list for cancellations before showing it as ‘Fully booked’.

Feb. 10

Black History Month Trolley Tour

Hop on the heated Woodlawn Conservancy Trolley to visit the gravesites of Madam C.J. Walker, W.C. Handy, Duke Ellington, Miles David, and more.

Tour is 1:45-4 p.m., $20 members and $25 non-members. Woodlawn Cemetery is at Jerome and Bainbridge Avenues, Bronx.

Feb. 11

Black-Owned Businesses: A History of Enterprise and Community in Brooklyn

Join the Brooklyn Historical Society for a talk about the legacy of Black-owned businesses that serve black communities in Brooklyn, presented along with the exhibit “The Business of Brooklyn.”

Speakers include historian Jason Bartlett and Black-Owned Brooklyn editor-in-chief Cynthia Gordy Giwa.

TD Bank will host a FREE reception at 5:15pm, talk is at 6:30pm. Tickets are $5. The Brooklyn Historical Society is at 128 Pierrepont St. in Brooklyn Heights.

Feb. 21

Lecture: African American Burial Ground

In 1991, archaeologists in lower Manhattan unearthed a stunning discovery. Buried for more than 200 years was a communal cemetery containing the remains of up to 20,000 people. At roughly 6.6 acres, the African Burial Ground is the largest and earliest known burial space of African descendants in North America. In the years that followed its discovery, citizens and activists fought tirelessly to demand respectful treatment of eighteenth-century funerary remains and sacred ancestors.

See Andrea E. Frohne, Associate Professor of African Art History at Ohio University discuss this political battle as well as her book on the African American burial ground within the context of the history of enslaved Africans in New York.
FREE at 6pm the Grand Central Branch of the NYPL

Feb. 23

The Search for Freedom in Queens

Visit the Bowne House, the oldest house in Queens, to learn about the Bowne and Parsons families’ work with the Underground Railroad. There will be craft activities for children.

1pm to 4pm., $5 for adults and $5 for kids participating in craft activities; 37-01 Bowne St., Flushing,

Black in Brooklyn

Learn about prominent black residents at Green-Wood Cemetery, including artist Jean-Michel Basquiat and Susan Smith McKinney Steward, the first black female doctor in New York. The tour will be led by historian Jeff Richman. Also, be sure to stop by the gravesite of Charles Ebbetts, whose Brooklyn Dodgers played in Ebbetts Field. This was the team that broke the baseball color barrier with the hiring of Jackie Robinson.