The August Quarterly Festival, also known as Big Quarterly, returned to Wilmington this year, marking its 211th gathering with worship, cultural celebration and a renewed focus on community well-being.
For some, it was a first-time experience. Al McKenzie, who moved to Delaware from New York in 2020, said he had never heard of August Quarterly until a fellow church member mentioned it to him. “She told me she was coming, and I decided to check it out,” McKenzie explained. His first impression was that the festival feels both family-oriented and faith-centered.
“It looks very, very positive,” McKenzie said, adding that he was especially looking forward to hearing gospel legend Vicki Winans perform. “I was just surprised that this event was taking place every year. I didn’t know.”
The festival commemorates the 1813 founding of the Union Church of Africans, the first independent African American church in the United States. Established by Peter Spencer, the church became a symbol of religious freedom for Black communities and the centerpiece of what would become the nation’s oldest African American religious festival.
August Quarterly began in 1814 and quickly became a kind of Independence Day for Black people on the Delmarva Peninsula. At a time when freedom of assembly was restricted, the festival gave free and enslaved people rare permission to come together. Many traveled from as far as the Maryland Eastern Shore, lower Delaware, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania. In its early years, abolitionists such as Thomas Garrett and Harriet Tubman were often in the Wilmington area to support enslaved people seeking freedom.
Over the generations, the gathering has remained a time of reunion, religious revival, and celebration of freedom. Its name reflects its timing, as the event has always concluded on the last Sunday in August.
A keynote message of empowerment
This year’s festival, hosted by Ron Whitaker, Senior Pastor of the Historic Mother African Union Church, was held under the theme “Shifting from Stress to a Place of Rest.”
Alongside worship services, organizers placed a spotlight on issues of mental health, substance use disorder, and cardiovascular health in Black communities. The festival also celebrated Black-owned businesses and announced a forthcoming documentary project, created with the Delaware Historical Society and supported by the Lilly Endowment, that will highlight the overlooked civil rights legacy of the August Quarterly.
A major highlight of this year’s events was the keynote sermon by scholar and author Michael Eric Dyson at the Chase Center. Known for his powerful reflections on race, culture and justice, Dyson delivered a message of empowerment and healing that bridges the spiritual and the social.
From its beginnings as a haven for worship and resistance, August Quarterly continues to honor its roots while impressing new generations with faith, history and community.
You can contact staff reporter Anitra Johnson at ajohnson@delawareonline.com. To share your community news and activities with our audience, join Delaware Voices Uplifted on Facebook.
