Decision Time

The Jim-Ree African American Museum will feature both permanent and rotating exhibits. A visitor to the Jim-Ree African American Museum can always expect to see a display featuring the following local heroes from Elbert County, Georgia: Kate and Jack Heard and William Henry Heard. Kate and Jack Heard, slaves, were American Revolutionary War heroes who saved their owner, Stephen Heard, from a Tory's hangman's noose. Stephen Heard later became a governor of Georgia. Nearly a century later, another slave, William Henry Heard, when freed after the Civil War became a Bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church and an author of two books: From Slavery to the Bishopric in the AME Church and The Bright Side of African Life. In the book, From Slavery to the Bishopric in the AME Church, William Henry Heard talked about his experiences, in Elbert County, Georgia, both as a slave and as a free man.

The rotating exhibits will be changed three times per year. One such display will feature a doll collection donated by Mrs. Mary Craft of Decatur, Georgia in honor of her sister Mrs. Sara Jo Willingham. Mrs. Sara Jo Willingham was a retired educator from the Elbert County, Georgia School System and a dedicated member of the Jim-Ree Black History Month Committee. The doll collection is a sample of dolls representing famous African Americans. Mrs. Mary Craft is pictured with a James Brown doll from the collection.