This image is of Peggy (R), then a 19 year-old SNCC member, next to future civil rights icon, Dr. Dorothy Cotton (L), after a 1962 church burning in Georgia—the state that Peggy's great-great grandparents, William & Ellen Craft, famously escaped from enslavement nearly 115 years earlier...
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S P E C I A L
W O R D...O R T W O...O R T H R E E...
Peggy Trotter Dammond Preacely
Dr. Dorothy Cotton
SUNDAY, 12.28.25
"FROM EMMETT TILL TO SNCC & BEYOND" BENEFIT ON FRIDAY, FEB. 20, 2026 @ 8 PM
I hope everyone is having a blessed holiday season! I have some new special words to share... On FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 2026 @ 8 pm, is an encore of the sold-out benefit I performed in October: "FROM EMMETT TILL TO SNCC & BEYOND: WORDS + MUSIC + ART BENEFIT to support the renowned Highways Performance Space in Santa Monica. Please secure your tax-deductible tickets at the Early Bird rate here before it sells out again! This special benefit encore is not only recognizing the 100th Anniversary of Black History Month, but is also commeorating the U.N's annual World Day of Social Justice (which is actually on February 20)... The October benefit commemorated the 70th Anniversary of Emmett Till's murder and the 65th Anniversary of SNCC's founding. As many know, both of those events are pivotal in my life—Emmett's murder elevated my activism as a teen, and my joining SNCC expanded it... And of course, Black History is significant to me due to my own family's historic stories, let alone the history I've witnessed firsthand as a member of SNCC. Further, because of the role my great-great-grandparents—William and Ellen Craft—played in the anti-slavery movement while in the U.K., that the UN has a World Day of Social Justice is very meaningful for me. In fact, the UK UNHCR recognized my great-great-grandparents as refugees... My performance on February 20, will include the poem I wrote exclusively for the Benefit and a poem I wrote as a young woman in SNCC... This benefit means a lot to me not only because of all that its commemorating, but Highways has been an artistic home for me, and I hope you're able to support it. If you can't attend, please donate here or bid on some wonderful art in the Online Silent Art Auction here.
The next special word is that I've been requested to keep on my home page the CBS Sunday Morning segment with me and acclaimed author, Ilyon Woo of The Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Master, Slave, Husband, Wife (Simon & Schuster)—about my great-great-grandparents William & Ellen Craft. Finally, please find downthread the poem I performed at the Long Beach Gospel Brunch in September, "A Ring Shout For Gospel"... My last appearance was on Saturday, 12/27/25 as an honoree at the 2025 Long Beach Kwanzaa Celebration to Celebrate Family, Community, and Culture at the EXPO Arts Center (for details click here). Thank you to all that attended...
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A RING SHOUT FOR GOSPEL
by Peggy Trotter Dammond Preacely
Come sing with us
Come clap with us
We’re on a Gospel Train
Let the music of our ancestors
free us from any ..and all our chains.
Oh, the codes we shared
In the holds of ships
on that Middle Passage so long ago
were the bonds that we forged
and the rhythms we carry
no matter wherever we go.
Oh the secrets we kept
And the tears that we wept
The songs we sang and, lo
The promises we made
That we never would break
No matter where ever we were sold.
We carried our music so deep in our hearts
As we stomped and clapped and shouted
in those deep back- woods circles…. so late at night
But our survival we never doubted.
We praised our God, with ring shouts, spirituals and story
In our tongues we sang of struggle, grace and glory
Through our Calls and Responses… most especially through our hymns
we circled, and shouted and danced in night
asking God for the strength in our weary bones…. in our every single limb.
But the words of the Gospels dispelled any doubt
(On those chain gangs, in prisons and worse)
That we would one day claim our FREEDOM
That slavery was designed to reverse.
So despite our tears ….for so many years
our voices are raised high in song
The Holy Spirit that dwells so deep in our spine
Would never allow the oppressor success
in blocking access to our God or The Divine.
So let us today, beat drums, link arms, ring gongs,
Lift voices in harmony, and song
For The Gospel Ring Shout lives on…. in each of us
For we know to whom we truly… belong!
Amen and Hallelujah!
© 2025 Peggy Trotter Dammond Preacely. All rights reserved.