![]() ![]() ![]() He started to view his collection of hip-hop concert flyers and cassettes as valuable memorabilia, not just keepsakes. He brought in a racist piggy bank and the whole class was shocked,” he says.Īs Pilgrim continued to bring in more racially-charged relics, el-Hakim grew more motivated. David Pilgrim was my sociology professor at Ferris. The Detroit native grew up collecting hip-hop concert flyers, cassettes, and comic books, but the true spark was ignited during his enrollment at Ferris State University in 1991. ![]() While certain pieces of his collection stay mobile, other pieces get leased for months at a time. in Museum Studies from the University of Illinois, el-Hakim’s collection has gone from a small hobby in his attic to the confines of a storage facility, then a graffiti-covered trailer, to now constantly touring. He owns “Whites Only” and “Colored Only” bathroom and water fountain signs and even a Ku Klux Klan hood he purchased at an auction. El-Hakim has signed documents and letters written by Malcolm X, Frederick Douglas, and George Washington Carver. The collection includes rusted metal shackles used by southern slave owners, slave auction newspaper clippings, and postcards depicting lynchings. I had never even done a digital presentation prior to all of this.”Įl-Hakim is the founder and curator of the Black History 101 Mobile Museum, a collection of over 10,000 historical artifacts and collectibles, related to topics ranging from slavery to current hip-hop culture, that has seen the inside of hundreds of classrooms and boardrooms. “I’ve been to 41 states and over 500 different institutions,” he says. Things improved a bit in 2021 but he’s still running a mix of virtual and live showings. ![]() His in-person exhibitions were replaced with Facebook Live and Zoom presentations. His 10-year run of hopping on and off planes with bustling suitcases full of African-American memorabilia stopped suddenly in 2020 (along with everything else) due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Khalid el-Hakim has finally found a sense of normalcy again, now that it’s 2022. ![]()
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