Tales from the crypt

February is Black History Month, and while there are a lot of interesting events happening at the library, perhaps a better way to learn history is to see it and touch it—by traveling to the Old City Cemetery. There, docents from the Old City Cemetery and the Sojourner Truth Multicultural Art Museum will give an overview of the 19th-century African-American community in the Sacramento area. The tour will highlight “colored” churches and visit graves of a local slave, an abolitionist, a Buffalo Soldier and a Civil War soldier. It will also talk about Ernest Johnson, the first black student to be accepted to Stanford University. The Roseville-born local was a football player who died of tuberculosis at the age of 27 and was buried in a corner of the Old City Cemetery, Stanford diploma in hand. In honor of Johnson’s historical feat, Stanford printed T-shirts reading “Black since 1891.” The historical cemetery tour is free and happens Saturday, February 26, at 10 a.m. at the Old City Cemetery, 1000 Broadway.