The Ocean City Arts Center presents Debra Mims in a one-woman show, “My Grandmother Told Me: A Tribute to African American Women”. The event will be held on Friday, June 20 at 6 p.m. in the Chris Maloney Lecture Hall of the Ocean City Public Library, 1735 Simpson Ave., Ocean City. It is free and open to the public. Reservations are suggested and can be made online at oceancityartscenter.org. We are celebrating and commemorating Juneteenth, the day in 1865 that the news of the Emancipation Proclamation reached the slaves in Galveston, Texas, two and one-half years after its pronouncement. This is a family-friendly event.
Actress and storyteller Debra Mims transforms into Grandmother Sally Kathryn Mims, who is searching through an old trunk in her attic. Each item she pulls out sparks a memory of days past and of courageous Black women and their struggles to be free, to vote, and to get an education. Using monologues, poetry and song, Debra leads the audience in this highly interactive walk through important parts of America’s history. There are tales of Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, the Juneteenth Celebration and many other stories Grandmother Sally will share with the audience.
Debra Mims has been an actress for over thirty years and was an arts producer at PBS for fourteen years. With additional training in dance, she received a BFA in Theatre Performance from Marygrove College in Detroit, Michigan. She has performed at the Georgetown Theatre Company, the Children’s Theatre in Madison, Wisconsin and the Detroit-Windsor Dance Company. Debra is the 2010 Individual Artist Award winner for solo performance from Maryland State Arts Council. She also won this award previously in 2004 and 2008. She is also a featured artist with Arts for Learning Maryland (formerly, Young Audiences of Maryland). Visit the Ocean City Arts Center website at oceancityartscenter.org for more information and to reserve your seat, or call (609) 399-7628.
This program is made possible in part by the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, a partner agency of the National Endowment for the Arts.
