This magazine, Florida’s first statewide Black arts culture and heritage magazine, was named after Estebana, the first Black child known to be born in what is now the United States. She was born on January 5, 1595, in St. Augustine, the Spanish settlement in Florida. Her mother, Garcia, was an enslaved Black woman. 

Not much is known about Estebana, her family or her life. Historians know that an African man, Juan Garrido, arrived in the New World with explorer Ponce de Leon in 1513, but little is known about Black life in the region during that time or in the decades that followed.

In fact, in 1883, over 350 years after Juan Garrido landed in Florida, famed Black humanitarian Josephine Turpin Washington wrote “Many an achievement of the Black race, glorious, great and grand, instead of being compiled in the annals of the people, instead of being woven in the story and song, instead of being talked on in the family circle and held up before the admiring eyes of our children, sleeps quietly in the grave of oblivion.” 

Today, many achievements remain untold. Shining a light on the contributions of Black people in Florida—past and present—is not only vital to Black history, but to American history. These stories, expressed through art, culture and heritage, form the foundation of who we are.

ESTEBANA Magazine exists to tell
those stories—to ensure they no longer sleep in oblivion.