Congolese Ambassador to visit Lynchburg for 3rd annual ‘We Remember Ota Benga’ memorial

The International Ota Benga Memorial Committee has announced that the Congolese Ambassador will visit Lynchburg for the 3rd annual “We Remember Ota Benga” Memorial Program on March 17.

The program is free and seats will be available first-come-first serve. The annual event starts at 3 p.m. and is a unique, spiritual, educational, and cultural experience, and takes place at the Jackson Street United Methodist Church.

The keynote speaker will be Dr. Didier Gondala, a Professor of History From John Hopkins University. He is known for his leading international expert on how to study the origins and restitution of African Art that was acquired during the colonial period.

The program will include official remarks by Her Excellency Marie-Hélène Mathey Boo Lowumba, the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary for the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and a performance by Gloria Simon and Chris Evans.

The memorial honors Ota Benga who was a Batwa or Mbuti man, and was born in the Kasai River region of the Congo in 1885. In 1904, he was brought to the United States to be exhibited at the St. Louis World’s Fair and later in the Monkey House of the Bronx Zoo.

It wasn’t until outraged Black ministers secured his release from the zoo that Benga was eventually placed at Virginia Theological Seminary and College (Virginia University of Lynchburg). However, disheartened over his inability to return home to Africa, Benga died by suicide in 1916.

Photograph of Ota Benga with chimpanzee, circa 1910,
by Bain News Service Courtesy of Library of Congress

The memorial service coincides with the 108th anniversary of Ota Benga’s death. His funeral service was held at the Diamond Hill Baptist Church, and he was buried in White Rock Cemetary, a historic African American Church, in the White Rock Hill neighborhood.