Princess Hairston

Editor, Director, Producer, Entrepreneur & Activist, CEO at Straight Path Pictures

As Donald Trump was getting sworn in as President and the Women’s March set an angry, outspoken tone for the country’s discourse, journalist Emily Ramshaw decided to meet the moment by launching The 19th. Named after the Nineteenth Amendment, The 19th became the first nonprofit, nonpartisan news agency in the United States. Its mission is to focus on the impact of national politics and policy on women. However, by the time Emily and co-founder Amanda Zamora had secured funding and officially launched The 19th’s news site, the pandemic hit — and the very fabric of society went into a tailspin.

Breaking the News immerses its audience in the lives and steadfast pursuits of the members of The 19th — women and LGBTQ+ journalists — as they struggle to launch the agency and work to gain traction for their newsroom amidst shuttered news outlets and an upended America. With spirited storytelling, the directorial trio of Heather Courtney, Princess A. Hairston, and Chelsea Hernandez provide an inquisitive and dynamic view into the inner workings of this news agency as its journalists disrupt entrenched biases and push for accountability.––Jose Rodriguez

Breaking the News

Interweaving her search for her African ancestors, director Princess A. Hairston unravels the history of the largest slave-holding family in the U.S. through the personal stories of Black and white individuals in the Hairston clan as her journey unveils a harrowing, hidden familial history, exposing America’s distorted narrative about slavery. 

Towards the end of the American Civil War, the Hairstons, a unique family from Scotland, owned over 42 plantations and over 10,000 slaves in Virginia, North Carolina, and Mississippi. This film features interviews from both Black and white Hairstons, some of whom admit finding out the truth about their family’s history was appalling and scandalous. Tracing the Hairstons chronicles the unique story of the only family with the name Hairston to arrive in America and their journey to becoming one of the largest slave-holding families in American history. The descendants of the white Hairstons, finally open up about their troubled ancestry and the descendants of the enslaved finally get to tell their ancestor’s stories that have been silenced for far too long. Tracing the Hairstons reveals the struggles and triumphs of a family that is connected together through the worst atrocity in American History. We learn why this dynamic family sets itself apart to be one of the most unique and largest family names in American history as the director herself peels away the layers of her ancestral history.

Tracing the Hairstons

Chewing-gum sculptures, a wealthy gallerist, a firebrand wrestler, a notorious murder case and the segregated south – it’s all part of Nellie Mae Rowe’s boundless universe. This World is Not My Own reimagines this self-taught artist’s world and her life spanning the 20th century.

This World is Not My Own

It is a short film about gentrification in Brooklyn. Residents in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn explain the effects gentrification has on their community.

Princess Hairston

Editor, Director, Producer, Entrepreneur & Activist, CEO at Straight Path Pictures

Breaking the News

Tracing the Hairstons

This World is Not My Own

Don't Expel the Blacks