Columbus City Manager to speak at Fort Benning observance | Military

Columbus, Ga. City Manager, Isaiah Hugley will be the guest speaker as Fort Benning celebrates Black History Month Feb. 21. 

The event will take place in the Derby Conference Room in McGinnis-Wickam Hall at 11 a.m.

Hugley will address the theme “At the Crossroads of Freedom and Equality: the Emancipation Proclamation and the March on Washington.” 

He has served as Columbus’ city manager since 2004.  Prior to being named city manager, he served as Columbus’ deputy city manager.  He has also served as deputy and as the director of Columbus METRA transit. He is a graduate of Talladega College and Mississippi State University.

This year’s theme marks the anniversary of the 1863 Emancipation Proclamation and the 1963 March on Washington.  It was during the August 1963 March on Washington that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his “I Have A Dream” speech from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

The program will include a musical performance by students of Pinehurst Christian School. 

African American/Black History Month began as Negro History Week in 1926, the idea of African-American author and scholar Dr. Carter G. Woodson.  In February, 1976, the event was established as Black History Month.

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