Black Culture Festival
The Reston Black Culture center was perhaps one of the events that gave Reston Black Focus the most notoriety. It usually had a heavy focus on African American art as its name suggests, but would also include speakers like the before mentioned Reverent Jesse Jackson. The heavy focus on culture would manifest itself in the form of exhibitions of African art, dance, literature, and poetry. The importance of the festival went beyond merely preserving and promoting Black culture to the small African American population that inhabited Reston, but to promote the image of Reston Black Focus as a community friendly organization. This can be seen in a quote by Reston Black Focus members when asked what they felt they had accomplished through the festival’s success, which mentioned on column 4 stating; “we have established ourselves as a significant part of the community despite our smallness”. The news article by Reston Times shows that thousandths of people have attended the annual Black Culture Festival in the fall of 1969. It even mentions that it had received visitors form Washington D.C. and other parts of suburban Virginia, while also including foreigners from about 20 countries that attended the festival. The event did include unfortunate the robbing of a necklace, which was on display and the decapitation and vandalization of a Black Jesus Statue.