A well-known San Francisco pastor and civil rights leader says he is frustrated by a change by the Smithsonian Museum.
Reverend Amos Brown said he loaned two artifacts to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. Now, the items will be returned to him in just a few days.
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WATCH HERE“A bible that I used in the Civil Rights struggle and we marched with Dr. [Martin Luther] King and went to jail. And also, the oldest history book of the Negro race that was written in 1880,” he said.
The history book written by George Washington Williams. Brown shared NBC Bay Area on Tuesday a group photo that showed him holding the book.
The return of his items comes after President Donald Trump issued an executive order in late March, targeting the Smithsonian Institution.
In a statement, it said "In recent years, it’s come under the influence of a divisive, race-centered ideology. The order added that they are going further to prohibit federal funding for Smithsonian programs not aligned with the Trump administration's goals.
But a spokesperson for the Smithsonian said that’s not the reason they’re sending Brown’s items back. In a statement, they said that Brown "generously loaned them to the museum for an exhibition and that the loan agreement expires in May and the return is standard museum practice.”
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Brown disputes that, saying he was sought out by the Smithsonian Museum when it opened in 2016 and every year, someone from it has called him and asking him to either donate the items or extend the loan.
“As blind as Ray Charles was, he could see this atmosphere was created by this administration,” Brown said. “It’s about the fact that the history and the legacy of a people has been tampered with.”
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SIGN UP Brown is now asking others to do what he has done.
“This is the delegation,” he said. “Since others don’t want to respect our stories, the good and the bad, we have to tell it ourselves.”
