Current Exhibits
Florida A&M University
CELEBRATES AMERICA 250: Highlighting the Meek-Eaton African American Military Collection
Curatorial Statement
Timothy A. Barber, Director
As Florida A&M University’s formal kickoff to America250FL, this exhibition is conceived as an act of scholarly stewardship—one that recognizes preservation not merely as custodianship of objects, but as a deliberate and ethical practice of historical transmission. The Meek-Eaton Black Archives Research Center a
nd Museum presents this exhibition in acknowledgment of the families and individuals who entrusted the institution with objects of profound personal and sentimental value, believing that memory, when responsibly preserved, becomes a foundation for education, inquiry, and civic understanding.
The materials assembled here—military uniforms, medals, photographs, documents, and personal effects—are not displayed as isolated artifacts or relics of conflict. Instead, they are presented as material witnesses to lived experience and intergenerational decision-making. Each object reflects a conscious act of care by those who preserved it long enough to be donated, and a corresponding act of trust placed in the archive to steward that history beyond the lifespan of any one individual or family. In this sense, the exhibition foregrounds the role of families as the first archivists, and of the museum as a partner in sustaining collective memory.
Spanning multiple eras of service, from the Revolutionary period through twentieth-century global conflicts and into contemporary military engagements, the exhibition aligns with America250FL’s mandate to interrogate the nation’s founding ideals and their evolution over time. The presence of early military service materials alongside modern objects asserts continuity within the American experience and emphasizes how national history is constructed not only through policy and warfare, but through everyday acts of service, sacrifice, and obl
igation. By situating these materials within a long temporal arc, the exhibition encourages visitors to consider how individual lives intersect with national purpose across generations.
Equally central to this curatorial approach is the balance between access and responsibility.
By bringing rarely seen materials out of secure archival storage and into public view, the Meek-Eaton affirms its role as both a research institution and a public-facing museum. This exhibition demonstrates how archival collections can be activated to expand historical literacy while maintaining professional standards of conservation, interpretation, and contextual rigor. The personal nature of the objects invites intimate engagement, while the curatorial framework situates them within broader scholarly and historical narratives.
Ultimately, this exhibition poses a reflective and forward-looking question that extends beyond the gallery walls: What will we leave behind? What objects, records, and stories will speak for us when we are no longer here to explain them? In asking what we will leave to tell our children’s children who we were and what we valued, FAMU Celebrates America 250 positions preservation as an act of responsibility to the future. Through this collection, Meek-Eaton invites audiences to recognize history as something actively shaped, carefully entrusted, and intentionally carried forward—one generation at a time.
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NOW OPEN THROUGH FALL 2026
Jim Crow and the Old South Gallery
The Upper Room Church Gallery
Marching 100 Hall
Medical Gallery
Kinsey Welcome Gallery
From Slavery to Freedom Gallery
African Gallery
Sandro Miller's CROWNS