EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Massachusetts

Marcus P. Smith is a Black studies scholar, public historian, and scholar-activist dedicated to preserving and interpreting African American communities, cultural landscapes, and grassroots preservation efforts across the United States. A Ph.D. candidate in the W.E.B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies and the Public History Graduate Program at UMass Amherst, he is the founder and Executive Director of the Black Grassroots Heritage Preservation Network (BGHPN) — a national advocacy and digital heritage platform documenting nearly 400 Black-led preservation projects through storytelling, interactive mapping, and community documentation. He is also the producer and host of Black Preservation Stories, a podcast exploring Black heritage and cultural resilience through the stories of grassroots preservation projects nationwide.

marcus@bghpn.org

ADVOCACY & COMMUNITY ORGANIZER
Minnesota

Samira Ali, a Public Historian, Archivist, Community Organizer, and cultural worker based in Minneapolis, centers her work on the intersections of race, class, housing, and historical memory. Her research and organizing focus on how working-class Black communities mobilize for material change and how those efforts are remembered, preserved, and made accessible through public history. Rooted in her lived experience and commitment to community-led preservation, Ali brings years of experience documenting public housing history, facilitating oral histories, and curating community-based exhibitions.

Samira@bghpn.org

BOARD MEMBER
Minnesota

Kaaha Kaahiye, also known as Wanaago Geedi, is a transdisciplinary writer, organizer, filmmaker, strategist, producer, and thinker from Minneapolis, MN. As a community organizer, educator, and long-time leader of Defend Glendale & Public Housing Coalition, her work revolves around global Black life and history, surveillance, and themes of dis/connection. 

As an artist and organizer, she engages memory-keeping practices and speculative world-building as tools to deliver systems change. Kaahiye has previously worked with Mixed Blood Theatre, The Qalanjo Project, Studio Arisaema, The Black Midwest Initiative, and others. She received a B.A. from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, with an individualized degree titled Writing and Producing Black Narratives.

BOARD MEMBER
Maryland

Dr. Dennis DeShields is a fourth-generation Bellevue, Maryland, resident and co-founder of the Bellevue Passage Museum with his wife, Dr. Mary DeShields. Through visits with his grandparents and aunt in Bellevue, both as a child and as an adult, Dennis developed a deep appreciation for the community’s history, culture, and traditions. Together, they have dedicated themselves to preserving Bellevue’s rich African American heritage by creating the Bellevue Passage Museum, a center for cultural preservation, education, and community engagement.

BOARD MEMBER
Mississippi

Hermon Johnson, Jr. epitomizes unwavering dedication and visionary leadership in his mission to breathe life back into his cherished hometown, Mound Bayou MS. With an unshakeable belief in the town's potential, he fervently envisions Mound Bayou as the epicenter of African American enterprise and culture in the United States. Co-founding the Mound Bayou Movement in 2006, Johnson orchestrated a global network of companies and partners, propelling the dream of revitalization into reality. At the heart of his achievements stands the impressive Mound Bayou Museum a testament to Johnson's tireless efforts in preserving the rich African American heritage and Mississippi's history.

BOARD MEMBER
New York

Monica T. Davis is an architectural designer, preservationist, and educator whose practice sits at the intersection of material culture, memory, and social justice. Founder of the Rebirthing Our Cultural Kingdom (R.O.C.K.) Foundation and Academic Director of the Master of Science in Historic Preservation program at Pratt Institute, she brings an uncommon lens to the field — one forged by an earlier career in forensic pathology that instilled a rigorous, investigative approach to reading built environments. Davis centers African American vernacular architecture and community-driven cultural landscapes in her work, challenging preservation frameworks that have historically marginalized these histories. Through teaching, research, and advocacy, she repositions the discipline not as the stewardship of monuments, but as a living practice grounded in empathy, material knowledge, and collective responsibility.

ADVISORY BOARD MEMBER
Community Engagement & Public Programming

Currently the Program Director of the Middle Passage Ceremonies and Port Markers Project which she founded in 2011, Ann Chinn was born into a Washington, D.C. family with a long record of social activism, teaching, health care, public service and storytelling. The mother of three and grandmother of five began her own life’s interest in culture, history and politics through extensive travels as well as accounts of people, places and events shared by family members. Attending parochial schools in the Washington/Maryland area, Mount Holyoke College, Yale University as a special student, and the George Washington University provided her with an academic foundation which expanded over time into social services planning, arts, business, community organizing and public history. She is married to Charlie Cobb, author, journalist, and civil rights activists. They live in Jacksonville, Florida.

ADVISORY BOARD MEMBER
Geographic Information Systems (GIS) & Interactive Mapping

Shana Crosson brings 30 years of experience in public history and education to her work with geospatial technologies, including positions at the Minnesota Historical Society and the University of Minnesota. She is committed to using GIS as a tool for studying, interpreting, and communicating about the world in meaningful ways. Central to her practice is a dedication to telling untold stories: through countermapping techniques, she works to give voice to narratives that are often oppressed or hidden. Shana is now a GIS consultant specializing in historical GIS, storytelling, and mapmaking through her company, Mapping Together.

ADVISORY BOARD MEMBER
Media & Technology

Kathryn De Shields-Moon is the Director of Programming for the Bellevue Passage Museum and Senior Public Relations Manager at Schell Games. A fifth-generation Bellevue resident, she is passionate about preserving and sharing her community’s history through innovative, engaging programs that connect past and present. She also serves on the Museum’s Board of Directors.

De Shields-Moon is passionate about preserving and sharing her community’s history through innovative, engaging programs that connect past and present. Her background in technology and digital communications brings valuable expertise in audience engagement, multimedia storytelling, and digital strategy to grassroots preservation work.