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“Camp Logan” Event Details

Camp Logan

Thursday, November 15, 2018

Doors open at 6 p.m. • Free Event

Join the Wittliff Collections for a dramatic reading by Texas State students from Camp Logan, the NAACP Image Award-winning play about racial injustice in Houston during the First World War, and the ensuing riot that left dozens dead, including 17 African American soldiers hanged for mutiny.

The evening will also feature a conversation with the playwright, Celeste Bedford Walker, conducted by Dr. Sandra Mayo. Walker and her play Camp Logan are featured in the Wittliff’s current exhibition, Literary Frontiers: Historical Fiction & the Creative Imagination. The dramatic reading is directed by Sidney Rushing, recent MFA graduate from Texas State.

Camp Logan is based on real-life events in Houston in 1917, when members of highly decorated 3rd Battalion, 24th Infantry Regiment were subjected to extreme Jim Crow treatment. Celeste Bedford Walker’s nuanced, suspenseful dramatization of this event has been performed all over the country, including the Kennedy Center. The Washington Post praised Camp Logan as “a textbook example of how to simultaneously entertain and educate an audience.”

RSVP HERE for parking instructions.

For assistance, or for mobility impaired/accessible parking, please call 48 hours in advance at 512-245-2313, press 0.

Author, Celeste Bedford Walker

Celeste Bedford Walker
Celeste Bedford Walker

Celeste Bedford Walker is the award-winning author of over forty plays that have been performed and viewed in major venues across the country. She has received the August Wilson Playwriting Award, multiple NAACP Image Awards, New York’s AUDELCO Award, and she was a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. She is a member of the Dramatists Guild of America and has been elected to membership in the Texas Institute of Letters, a distinguished honor society founded in 1936 to celebrate Texas literature and recognize distinctive literary achievement. Walker recently began donating her literary papers to the Wittliff Collections at Texas State University.

Moderator, Dr. Sandra Mayo

Dr. Sandra Mayo
Dr. Sandra Mayo

Dr. Sandra Mayo is the author and editor of several books, including Stages of Struggle and Celebration: A Production History of Black Theatre in Texas (as co-author) and the Acting Up and Getting Down: Plays by African American Texans (as co-editor.) She is Professor Emeritus at the Department of Theatre and Dance, Texas State University.

Student Performers

Six student actors at Texas State have been selected by director Sidney Rushing to perform the dramatic reading: Malik James as Sgt. McKinney; Jordan Gregson as Gweely Brown; Michael J. Moody, Jr. as Joe Moses; Evan James Ledet as Jacques “Bugaloosa" Honoré, JaVaun Butler as Franciscus and as Charles Hardin; Jack Durham as Capt. Zuelke. Kiara Daniels will narrate. Trumpet performance will be provided by Joshua Salmon.

Director, Sidney Rushing

Sidney Rushing
Sidney Rushing

Sidney Rushing, who received his MFA in Theatre from Texas State in May 2018, has enjoyed an accomplished career as an educator, writer, and actor. He has received numerous awards for his teaching in Texas public schools. He’s received awards for his playwriting and, as an actor, he’s been praised by the New York Times and Chicago Tribune for his “knockout” performances.