Longtime Barter Theatre actor will be honored for his work to promote Black history and culture in Appalachia

Longtime Barter Theatre actor Terrance Jackson said he and his family were “over the moon” when surprised recently with the news that he’s won an award for his work portraying the richness and diversity of Black history and culture in Appalachia — on and off the stage.

But rather than shine the spotlight on himself, the Abingdon theater’s director of outreach and director of the program Black Stories Black Voices hopes that the award from the 400 Years of African American History Commission will bring attention to the theater’s diversity efforts and encourage others to do the same.

“I thank the entire 400 Years of African American History Commission just for really seeing the importance and value of the work that we’re doing at Barter Theatre,” he said. “Yes, it’s a win for me. But really, it’s a win for Black theater in Appalachia. My hope is that incredible stories of Black people in our region will continue to be highlighted and platformed on the largest of stages and not just at Barter, but hopefully people will see this award and say, ‘You know what, we can do something like that too.’ We at Barter would love to teach other places how to tell the stories of their regions, their areas, of their communities.”

Jackson, a native of Sarasota, Florida, now lives in Augusta, Georgia. He got his love of theater and the arts from his mother, who spent her days working at a county jail and her nights performing in community theater.

In 2013, eight days after graduating from the University of Central Florida in Orlando, he moved to Abingdon to work at the state theater as a Barter player, which is an actor who works mostly in the shows for young audiences. It’s a sort of apprenticeship, Jackson said.

He worked on and off for the Barter until 2017, appearing in a number of plays, including several stints in his favorite role as the snowman in “Frosty,” a popular holiday musical.

In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, he returned to Barter to help stage plays at the nearby Moonlite Drive-In Theatre. At the time, the drive-in had been shut down for years, and Barter officials saw it as a way to keep their live theater going at a time when many were closed.

“It was a real privilege to be one of the actors who helped the Barter stay open during that time when a lot of theaters were not,” Jackson said.

After the May 2020 murder of George Floyd, a Black man killed by a white police officer in Minneapolis, a lot of arts organizations, including theaters, realized they needed to start telling more diverse stories, he said. Those at Barter created the Black Stories Black Voices program and named Jackson as its director.

Black Stories Black Voices

Learn more about the Barter Theater’s program Black Stories Black Voices at bartertheatre.com/black-stories-black-voices/ .

Its purpose is to “tell and amplify Black stories and Black voices through playwriting, acting and all theatrical disciplines,” Jackson says on the Barter website.

“With BSBV, we hope to help shine a light on the richness of the Black experience in the Appalachian region, and for this region, with plays, readings, and community engagement opportunities such as our post show events during our main stage season and our annual SHINE: Illuminating Black Stories event.”

Last year, the theater staged a play called “Skeleton Crew,” which had an all-Black cast and a Black director. It tells the story of the closing of an auto plant and the effects on the workers and community.

He appeared in two more productions in 2023, “To Kill a Mockingbird,” in which he portrayed the character of Tom, the Black man falsely accused of rape, and the popular production of “Miracle on 34 ^th Street” last Christmas.

Over the last three years, Jackson has gotten to know Ron Carson, founder of the Appalachian African-American Cultural Center in Pennington Gap, a small town in Lee County. They met when Jackson attended the center’s Aug. 8 celebration of Emancipation Day, which marks the freeing of slaves.

Carson has since led workshops at the Barter and has become a mentor to Jackson. It was Carson who nominated him for the Distinguished 400 Award, which is the 400 Years of African American History Commission’s highest honor.

“For him to come in and promote the Black Stories Black Voices program and put it into plays that show that African Americans have stories, too, whether it’s farming or coal mining, we have stories too. Terrance just came into this area and promoted African American history in far Southwest Virginia,” said Carson, who is vice chairman of the commission.

Since the mid-1980s, Carson said he has been working to do the same thing through the center. He said he especially appreciates the Barter’s efforts and its leaders for the program because he is an African American who grew up in Southwest Virginia in the 1950s, when he never dreamed of being able to attend a play at the theater during those times of segregation.

The honor is an outstanding achievement and service award intended to recognize the “distinguished members of our society who’ve served their community through non-profit, philanthropy, public service, and volunteerism while implementing a positive influence benefiting those in an underserved population,” according to the commission’s website.

The 15-member federal commission was created in 2018 to coordinate the 400 ^th anniversary of the arrival of the first 20 enslaved Africans in the English colonies in 1619, its website states.

Katy Brown, Barter’s artistic producing director said of the honor for Jackson: “We are thrilled for Terrance Jackson to be honored with this prestigious award and that his work with Black Stories Black Voices is being recognized in this way at the national level.”

The award will be given to Jackson at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, which is Aug. 8, Emancipation Day. The presentation will be held on the main stage, just before the night performance of “Shawshank Redemption.”

Jackson said some of his family members will be there, and he’s especially honored that Carson will attend.

After the show, Jackson said a “talkback” will be held called “Free at Last?” He will be joined by Carson and they will discuss what freedom meant for the first to celebrate Emancipation Day, and what it means for the Black community today.

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