The Adirondack History Museum will conclude its summer lecture series with “Tales from the Black Woods” with Amy Godine on Thursday, Sept. 7.

Godine’s lecture explores Essex County stories including how a self-emancipated slave from New Orleans wound up on an Adirondack homestead, why a black collier and Civil War veteran from New Russia took the famous abolitionist, Gerrit Smith, to court, and how it was that a slave owned prime lakefront property in Lake Placid and never knew a thing about it. Each of these stories underscores the deep appeal of land ownership and farming for black families before the Civil War, and celebrates the richness of the 19th-century black Adirondack experience.

Admission is free for museum members, and $8 for nonmembers. A reception with light refreshments will be held at 6 p.m., with the lecture starting at 7 p.m. For more information, contact (518) 873-6466 or echs@adkhistorymuseum.org.