Washington, D.C., District of Columbia story
A Legacy of Freedom
Imagine a monument funded not by the government, but by the hard-earned wages of formerly enslaved people. That is the story of the Emancipation Memorial in Lincoln Park. Dedicate…
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Imagine a monument funded not by the government, but by the hard-earned wages of formerly enslaved people. That is the story of the Emancipation Memorial in Lincoln Park. Dedicated in 1876, this bronze statue depicts Abraham Lincoln and an enslaved man modeled on Archer Alexander.
At its unveiling, Frederick Douglass gave the keynote address before a crowd of over 25,000 people and President Ulysses S. Grant. For years, the statue faced west toward the U.S.
Capitol, but in 1974, it was rotated east to face the Mary McLeod Bethune memorial. It stands today as a powerful reminder of a community's determination to honor its own journey toward liberty.
Updated June 2026