Lighting the Kwanzaa unity candle begins celebration of family, community, and culture

Nearly 200 people packed the Toledo Lucas County Public Library’s Kent branch in 1998 to celebrate the first day of Kwanzaa. In this Blade archive photo, Keith Polin lights the center unity candle on the kinara, part of a display that features harvest crops, an ear of corn, and other symbols of the holiday. The program featured African music, fashion, and dancing, as well as a workshop on building unity. Kwanzaa, which means “first fruits”, was created in 1966 by Maulana Karenga, professor and chairman of Black studies at California State University, Long Beach, after the Watts riots in Los Angeles. Each day of the weeklong celebration, which this year begins Monday, features one of the seven principles of the holiday: unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity, and faith.