Cover page of the Constitution, General Laws, and By-Laws of the Supreme Grand Tabernacle of the Order of Galilean Fishermen of Baltimore City. 1911. Maryland State Archives, Special Collections, 5339–219–1.
Graduate Student Ashford King has contributed a feature article, "The Grand United Order of Galilean Fishermen: A Baltimore-Based International African American Mutual Aid Organization with Ties to Laurel Cemetery," to the Winter 2025 edition of the Laurel Cemetery Memorial Project Newsletter. The Laurel Cemetery Memorial Project (LCMP) researches, documents, and memorializes those individuals interred at Laurel Cemetery in Baltimore, Maryland, an African American cemetery that was paved over and developed into a shopping mall beginning in 1958. King's article highlights the connections of the African American mutual aid organization known as the Grand United Order of Galilean Fishermen (OGF) to the cemetery. King's research on this group came in the course of his research for a journal article on the history of Navassa Island in the Caribbean, which hosted a revolt by guano miners in 1889. The legal defense of these laborers, many of whom were from the Baltimore area, was arranged by the OGF. The OGF was founded in Baltimore in 1856. The organization grew to boast a large membership spanning the eastern United States and the Caribbean, and its central purpose was to pay sick leave benefits and funeral costs to workers and their families.
Access the LCMP Winter 2025 newsletter.
See King's peer-reviewed article on Navassa Island, published in the journal Atlantic Studies.