FREE Shaw Black History Month Tour: Walking with Woodson, 02/21/26, 10 AM!

Walk with Woodson

When: Saturday, February 21, 2026 from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.

Where: Mary McLeod Bethune Council House National Historic Site, 1318 Vermont Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20005

Cost: Free

Photo by Alexander M. Padro, Courtesy Shaw Main Streets

A Shaw tradition presented during Black History Month, visitors will literally “walk” with “Dr. Woodson,” creator of Black History month, through the same neighborhood that inspired him 100 years ago. This tour features a professional actor, Dexter Hamlett, playing the role of the Father of Black History. Together with the reenactor, Shaw historian Alexander Padro and National Park Service Rangers will regale visitors with stories and first-person accounts from the neighborhood that both Dr. Woodson and Mary McLeod Bethune called home.

This year marks the 100th anniversary of Dr. Carter G. Woodson establishing Negro History Week and the 50th anniversary of the observance becoming Black History Month.

The tour will discuss national heroes and sheroes that were Dr. Woodson’s neighbors, living and working in Shaw and with whom Dr. Woodson collaborated, like A. Philip Randolph, Langston Hughes, and Elijah Muhammad. The tour will include a visit to the Woodson Memorial and a stop at the Woodson Home National Historic Site, scheduled to open this year. The tour concludes with refreshments at Shiloh Baptist Church’s Henry C. Gregory III Family Life Center. 

“Walking with Woodson” is presented by the National Park Service, US Department of the Interior.