Glynis Johns is telling stories of the past with the hope of a better future

Growing up in the 1990s, Glynis Johns would often tell people she was from Philadelphia or Baltimore. 

They seemed cooler and far more diverse, she explained, than where she was actually from: Scranton. 

“Before I even left high school, like since my whole life, I just dreamed about going somewhere else — leaving Scranton, starting a whole new life,” Johns said. 

Eventually, she did say goodbye to Scranton, a city in northeastern Pennsylvania that’s the birthplace of President Joe Biden. Members of Johns’ family had arrived in Scranton in the 19th century after enlisting in the Union Army as enslaved people.

After graduating from high school, Johns headed to her dream place: New York City, where she attended St. John’s University and got her master’s degree in sociology.

She thought she’d end up as a professor in Brooklyn or perhaps work in a museum. But something changed. As she was writing her master’s thesis about Scranton, she learned how much Black history there is in her hometown. Very little of that history, if any, is discussed in the city’s schools or celebrated in the community, Johns said, and she became determined to change that.

“With that work, I started to realize that there’s so much history,” Johns said of the research she did for her master’s thesis. “I’m finding Black residents here until the beginning of the 1800s; I’m finding Black residents that used the Underground Railroad, chose Scranton as their home, became successful business owners, participating in the local elections, creating political clubs and different groups, making sure students are educated, and creating arts and culture groups. And it was just really incredible for me to see this.”

While Johns said there was some recognition of national Black history in Scranton, such as commemorations of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, there was hardly any information about the local Black figures who had helped to shape a city that was once an industrial powerhouse and has more recently been making an economic turnaround. Johns wanted people to learn about the oft-ignored Black historical figures, but not only that: She hoped that a deeper understanding of Black roots in Scranton would foster a sense of pride and belonging among the city’s current Black residents and inspire change in an area where there are few Black individuals teaching in the city’s schools or serving in local government. 

She hoped that by understanding history, the children growing up in Scranton now would not feel as she once had: that this city is not for them, or that they will need to leave to find home.

That’s where the Black Scranton Project enters the picture. 

Johns launched the Black Scranton Project in 2019, and the organization officially became a nonprofit that year on Juneteenth, a day that marks the end of slavery in the United States. Now housed in an 8,000-square-foot, century-old former bank, the nonprofit offers residents a chance to peruse a trove of old photos and stories of Black Scrantonians, spend time in the group’s library, and view exhibits showcasing both past and present residents, as well as modern Black artists from Scranton and across the globe.

Johns is emphatic that the space isn’t only about history; she wants the community to know they have a dedicated center where people can gather for birthdays, weddings, book clubs, open mic nights, political meetings — the state’s Legislative Black Caucus, for example, has met there. The nonprofit also hosts Black History Month, Juneteenth and Kwanzaa celebrations. 

“It’s been really cool to see how people have transformed the space for their own type of events,” Johns said. “And that’s exactly what I want. I want people to come be able to use the space for however they want.” 

Over the past five years, the Black Scranton Project has grown significantly. It has found a physical home, drawn visitors from throughout the country and the world, and expanded its archives and programming. Word about the nonprofit has traveled to some of the most powerful people in the commonwealth. Gov. Josh Shapiro and first lady Lori Shapiro recently honored Johns, along with eight other community leaders, at a state dinner on Oct. 21. The event was held to celebrate “Pennsylvanians who do meaningful work to improve the lives of others across the commonwealth,” according to a press release issued by the governor’s office. 

Being honored at the state dinner was moving for Johns, and she explained that such events provide her a platform that allows her to reach people beyond her community.

She hopes that the more marginalized people can connect in Scranton and beyond, the stronger they’ll be when dealing with racism in their own lives. 

“I face resistance, racism, discrimination, biases every single day,” Johns said. “I have experienced people attacking my property, vandalizing our property.”

“I experience really nasty comments on the internet,” she continued. “I’ve experienced people making anti-whatever-I’m-doing pages about me and my org. And, for me, I just screenshot it and add it to the archive. Because, you know what this to me is? It’s a case study. It shows exactly why I’m doing this. Because people are resistant to people who want to take up space. And I’m not taking up more space than I deserve.”

Slowly, Johns is seeing her community change. There’s more recognition of the wide variety of cultures that exist in Scranton, from expanded Black History Month celebrations to commemorations of Hispanic Heritage Month and Indigenous Peoples’ Day, she said. She hopes the Black Scranton Project will continue to push her community to be more inclusive. 

Someday, she believes, Scranton’s Black children will grow up and never feel like outsiders as she did. They’ll rightfully see their faces represented in their city’s history, and know there’s a future there for them.