COMMENTARY: 'History Is Our Greatest Teacher'
Fredericksburg Mayor Kerry Devine on the importance of naming our problems.
Editor’s Note: The Fredericksburg Branch of the NAACP sponsored its annual prayer breakfast on Monday in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. As a part of the event, Mayor Kerry Devine delivered the following comments, which the Advance is honored to reproduce.
Good morning, Fredericksburg. To President Jackson-Fields, the NAACP leadership, our faith leaders, my colleagues on City Council and other elected officials, and every neighbor here today: thank you. We gather this morning not just to eat, but to remember. And in 2026, the act of remembering has become a radical act of courage.
I stand before you today as Mayor, but as many of you know, I also speak to you as a high school teacher. When you spend your days in a classroom, you learn very quickly that young people have a profound internal compass for the truth. They can sense when you are being honest with them, and they can certainly sense when a story is being hidden or sanitized. My students have always been my greatest reminder that history isn’t just a list of dates in a textbook—it is the foundation of who they are allowed to become.
That is why this past weekend was so significant. Less than 48 hours ago, our students—especially our young women—watched a 247-year-old glass ceiling shatter in Richmond.
On Saturday, we witnessed the swearing-in of Governor Abigail Spanberger, the first woman to lead this Commonwealth. As a teacher, I think about the lesson that ceremony taught: that the “arc of the moral universe” does indeed bend toward justice. It was a morning that affirmed Dr. King’s vision—that merit, character, and service are what define leadership, not the traditional boundaries of the past. Governor Spanberger’s inauguration is a victory for representation, but it is also a reminder that our history is not static—it is something we write together, day by day. I’m sad to say that Saturday evening we also lost an amazing pioneer - Dr. Gladys West passed away at the age of 93.
However, as we celebrate progress in Richmond, we cannot ignore the shadows growing in our nation’s capital. As an educator, I am alarmed by the shadows falling over our national narrative and deeply troubled by efforts to sanitize our national story. We are currently witnessing an unprecedented effort to reach into our national museums and classrooms to pack away the “uncomfortable” parts of our story. Today, MLK, Jr. Day has also been removed as a free day of entry to our National Parks.
We see artifacts of resistance being packed away into crates. We hear of “audits” designed to purge “improper ideology”—a phrase used to justify removing the very stories of struggle, like the Greensboro sit-in stools or the Bibles of civil rights leaders, that define the Black experience in America.
Perhaps most dangerously, we see an attempt to rewrite the events of January 6th—to take a day of violent insurrection and paint it as a “day of love” or a peaceful protest. We must call this what it is: an attempt to erase the truth because the truth is uncomfortable.
I teach my students that you cannot solve a problem you refuse to name. When we allow false narratives to take root, we aren’t just “protecting” people from discomfort; we are robbing the next generation of the tools they need to build a better world. Dr. King warned that “nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance.” As a teacher, I see that danger every day. If we let the truth be erased, we lose the map to our future.
But let them look to Fredericksburg to see how a city faces its history with integrity. We chose a different path.
When we moved the Slave Auction Block from the corner of William and Charles Streets, we didn’t do it to hide our past. We did it so we could finally tell the truth about it. While others are removing history from museums, we are leaning into ours.
Our progress on the Auction Block site continues. We are moving forward with the interpretive phase and the creation of a permanent memorial. We are working with historians and descendants to ensure that when people stand on that corner, they don’t see a void—they see the names, the stories, and the undeniable humanity of those who were once sold there. In Fredericksburg, we don’t pack our history into crates; we plant it in the soil of our community so that justice can grow. We are proving that a community can face its scars and still move forward with its head held high.
So today, I ask you to join me in being guardians of the truth. Let us support our new Governor as she begins her historic term, but let us also stand firm against any attempt to sanitize our children’s education or our nation’s memory. The Dream is not a fairy tale—it is a demand. It demands that we remember the struggle, acknowledge the pain, and celebrate the milestones without ever losing sight of the work still ahead.
History is our greatest teacher. Let’s make sure we listen to her.
Thank you, and Happy Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.
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