Conversations with Renée Ater, This is America series

In April 2021, I moderated a series of three conversations with artists and designers who have created monuments and memorials to the slave past. I was fortunate to be speak with Vinnie Bagwell, Manuelita Brown, Becci Davis, Ed Hamilton, Katie MacDonald and Kyle Schumann (After Architecture), Shane Allbritton and Norman Lee (RE:site Studio), Julian Arrington and Dayton Schroeter (SmithGroup), David S. Newton, Mario Chiodo, and Jerome Meadows. The conversations were part of the This Is America series (a series of conversations about racial slavery, its legacies, and anti-Black racism), sponsored by the Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice (CSSJ) at Brown University.

This is America: Black Monument Builders, April 2021

This is America: Design Practices and Memorializing Difficult Histories

This is America: Memorializing Black Death

Monument Interventions: Projects from AFRI0840, Brown University

For my class on “Monuments, History, and Memory” at Brown University, students engaged the Monument Lab Field Trip. For their final project, students were required to create either a new monument or monument intervention. I invited students to present their monument projects in an online symposium in March 2021. Sponsored by the Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice at Brown University, four students presented their interventions: Noah Howard, Miya Matsuishi-Elhardt, Avery Oliver, Ciara Sing,

On the Removal of Statues: Freedmen's Memorial to Abraham Lincoln

On June 27, 2020, I wrote a six-part post about the Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln in Washington, DC, on LinkedIn. A friend asked that I make it into a blog post. Here it is with revisions.

Thomas Ball, Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln (Emancipation Group), 1876. Lincoln Park, Washington, DC. Photograph by Renée Ater, 2009.

Thomas Ball's Freedmen's Memorial to Abraham Lincoln (1876) is a monument that I considered in my dissertation and wrote about in my book on Meta Warrick Fuller (chapter 3); one that I taught for twenty years; and most recently, one which begins a monument tour that I have given for two summers to a group of Fulbright Scholars on the problems of the memorial landscape in Washington, DC. I am well-versed in its history.

I view it as a complete failure of representation, rooted in nineteenth-century Neoclassical image-making based in racial type (that can be traced back to ancient examples); condescending gesture in the guise of equality; and a celebration of mythic republican ideals that were never upheld. This monument should be taken down. Its presence in 21st-century public space makes no sense. I am in agreement with Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton's call for the removal of the Freedmen's Memorial to Abraham Lincoln from Lincoln Park.

In his book, The Emancipation and the Freed in American Sculpture (1913), Freeman Henry Morris Murray asked a set of questions about race and public sculpture: "What does it mean? What does it suggest? What impressions is it likely to make on those who view it? What will be the effect on present-day problems, of its obvious and also of its insidious teachings?" These are fundamental questions we should ask of every monument.

Thomas Ball, Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln (Emancipation Group), 1876. Lincoln Park, Washington, DC. Photograph by Renée Ater, 2009.

Let's take a close look at the monument in relation to dress and gesture in order to understand why it is a problematic representation.

Ball’s composition includes two figures, one fully clothed, the other semi-nude. Due to the dozens of photographs that survive from the 1860s, we recognize that the standing bearded man is Abraham Lincoln. Dressed in a shirt with tie, a long coat, and trousers, Lincoln stands upright with most of his weight on one leg, in "contrapposto." Clothing and posture civilize Lincoln, marking his intelligence and morality.

The kneeling man, a newly emancipated enslaved person, is semi-nude. The only article of clothing that he wears is a piece of cloth draped from his waist to the edge of his buttocks. The sinewy muscles are clearly delineated in the man’s arms, legs, and abdominal muscles. Modeled with short curly hair, the former slave is also shown with a distinctive broad nose, signifying his African ancestry. We know from the historical record that former slave Archer Alexander was “the model” for the freedman. Yet, the portrait does not function as portraiture because it represents a racial type.

These attributes—nudity and the emphasis on his musculature and physiognomy—suggests “the savage,” a virulent image seen in a range of nineteenth-century visual culture. This difference between “the civilized man” and “the savage,” between Lincoln and the kneeling figure, is embedded in how we are meant to understand the image. This difference is the “insidious teaching.”

Gesture plays an important role as well in how we read the image. Lincoln’s right hand holds an unfurling scroll, the Emancipation Proclamation, which rests atop an octagonal-shaped plinth or short column. Lincoln’s left arm extends over the back of the kneeling man, his left index finger extending slightly upward. Ball modeled broken manacles on the kneeling man’s wrists; in his right fist, he grasps the links tightly, suggesting he has broken the bonds of slavery. Lincoln’s gesture is meant to show benevolence; the kneeling man’s gesture self emancipation. Instead, their gestures highlight a power differential—the might of the president as right and good, and the subservience of the kneeling figure as grateful and obsequious. Although the kneeling slave is supposed to have broken his own bonds, it is Lincoln who bestows freedom. The power relationship is one of a father and child, not an image of two men side-by-side in the quest for equality, freedom, and full citizenship.

Thomas Ball, Detail of Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln (Emancipation Group), 1876. Lincoln Park, Washington, DC. Photograph by Renée Ater, 2009.

Thomas Ball, Detail of Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln (Emancipation Group), 1876. Lincoln Park, Washington, DC. Photograph by Renée Ater, 2009.

The two architectural elements are also included and carry significant meaning. On the plinth/column is a profile portrait of George Washington. On either side of the portrait, Ball included fasces, a bundle of rods with an axe head, an ancient Roman symbol of judicial authority. In the context of the U.S. government, the fasces represents the power of the state over its citizens. Opposite the portrait of Washington is a modified shield with thirteen stars, representing the original thirteen colonies. Thirteen stars also adorn the base of the short column. I am reminded here that the colonies codified slavery into law and into American life.

Lincoln grasps the Emancipation Proclamation in his hand, resting it on top of a book and the column. Along the top of the column are stars representing the states in the Union in 1876. Ball used this imagery to make a direct connection between the republicanism of George Washington and that of Lincoln. Yet, in the present day, this imagery underscores the fact that George Washington was a slave owner and that the very fabric of the nation was interwoven with the subjugation and oppression of black people through the heinous system of slavery.

Thomas Ball, Detail of pillory from Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln (Emancipation Group), 1876. Lincoln Park, Washington, DC. Photograph by Renée Ater, 2009.

The architectural element behind Lincoln and the newly emancipated man appears to be a wood stump. It is a post pillory that is roughly cut with a piece of cloth draped across its top. A vine of roses trails from the bottom of the pillory to mid-way up, interlacing into the ring attached to it. A ball and chain rests at the base of the torture device. Here Ball attempted to signal that slavery and the use of pillory had come to an end—the climbing vine can be read as representing strength and determination.

Murray would implore us to ask what exactly does this image mean in the twenty-first century. In 1913, he wrote that monuments are not static objects whose meanings remain the same through time. Although we may believe that a monument’s meaning is fixed in space and time, this simply is not true. We must constantly ask what is the monument saying and doing in the present. This monument, with an additional cast in Boston, uses archetypal imagery of the slave, a black man stripped of clothing, and whose self-emancipatory gesture is subsumed by his kneeling pose and the towering figure of a benevolent Lincoln.

Robert Berks, Mary McLeod Bethune Memorial, 1974. Lincoln Park, Washington, DC. Photograph by Renée Ater, 2009.

It’s present-day location is also key to how we understand Freedmen's Memorial to Abraham Lincoln. The monument resides in Lincoln Park with the Mary McLeod Bethune Memorial. Installed at the east end of the park in 1974, the Bethune Memorial celebrates the noted educator and civil rights activist. Its exuberant modern form further undermines the currency of the Ball monument.

This is a well-used public space. At the east end of the park, two children's playgrounds frame the Bethune Memorial. On any given day, you can hear the excited play of children. What does it mean that each and every day that children enter this park, they must encounter an anachronistic monument of a kneeling black man in supplication to the heroic, fully dressed Abraham Lincoln? I would not want my grandson—a beautiful, happy little boy with an engaging smile—to encounter such a monument that emphasizes inequality and stereotype.

It is not enough to argue that free blacks and formerly enslaved paid for the monument. It is not enough to argue that Archer Alexander's image is the model for the kneeling figure. It is not enough to argue that Frederick Douglass delivered the dedicatory speech and recognized the role of Lincoln in black freedom. It is not enough to argue that racist imagery has a lesson to teach us now. It is not enough to simply reinterpret for a 21st-century public. We understand what we see. Freedmen’s Memorial should not remain in this space.

Ed Hamilton, Spirit of Freedom, African American Civil War Monument, 1998. Washington, DC. Photograph by Renée Ater, 2012.

I can think of one monument in Washington, DC, that celebrates empowered black men, responsible for fighting for their freedom. As I have written elsewhere, Ed Hamilton's Spirit of Freedom and the African American Civil War Monument directly challenge the visual vocabulary of the Ball monument and the notion of what black emancipation and freedom can look like. Sited at Vermont Avenue and U and 10 Streets, NW, this monument dedicated to the United States Colored Troops asks us to reconsider the role of black men and black families in their own self-emancipation. It's a strong visual statement, handled with care and deep consideration. These are men consciously fighting to be free of slavery, standing erect, fully clothed, caught in the surge to battle. It recognizes a multi-generational family on the back of the monument, in its concave form, who also stand for freedom. Unfortunately, it is also a monument that many visitors to the city never see because of its location outside the monumental core of Washington, DC. What would it look like to re-envision the monumental core of Washington to include the story of slavery, emancipation, and freedom?

Ed Hamilton, Spirit of Freedom 1998. Washington, DC. Photograph by Renée Ater, 2012.

Ed Hamilton, Spirit of Freedom 1998. Washington, DC. Photograph by Renée Ater, 2012.

POSTSCRIPT: Last October, I gave a lecture for the Friends of the Boston Public Garden, focusing on monuments to United States Colored Troops. Before the talk, I walked around the neighborhood of my hotel and came upon a second cast of Thomas Ball’s Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln. The inscription on its based points to the problems I have outlined above: “A Race Set Free and the Country at Peace, Lincoln, Rests from his Labors.” I was struck anew that the monument is misplaced in time. During the question and answer period, I argued that such imagery has no place in public space today and lacked significant meaning in the 21st century. To my surprise, I learned today that the Boston Art Commission voted unanimously to remove the city’s cast of the Ball monument from public view.

Thomas Ball, Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln (Emancipation Group), 1879. Park Square, Boston, Massachusetts. Photograph by Renée Ater, 2019.

For those interested in a full narration of the commission and creation of the monument, see Kirk Savage, Standing Soldiers, Kneeling Slaves: Race, War, and Monument in Nineteenth-Century America, new edition (1997; Princeton University Press, 2018).

UPDATE: July 4, 2020

Today, the Wall Street Journal ran a story about the discovery of Frederick Douglass response to Thomas Ball’s Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln. On April 19, 1876, Douglass wrote in part: “The negro here, though rising, is still on his knees and nude. What I want to see before I die is a monument representing the negro, not couchant on his knees like a four-footed animal, but erect on his feet like a man.” Historian Scott Sandage uncovered Frederick Douglass’ letter to the editor of the National Republican:

Frederick Douglass, “A Suggestion: To the Editor of the National Republican,” National Republican, April 19, 1876. Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn86053573/1876-04-19/ed-1/?sp=4&r=0.073,1.119,0.367,0.186,0

Ted Mann, “How a Lincoln-Douglass Debate Led to a Historic Discovery,” Wall Street Journal, July 4, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-a-lincoln-douglass-debate-led-to-historic-discovery-11593869400. For the full story, see Jonathan W. White and Scott Sandage, “What Frederick Douglas Had to Say About Monuments,” Smithsonian Magazine, June 30, 2020, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/what-frederick-douglass-had-say-about-monuments-180975225/.

Bullard & Bullard, National Emancipation Monument, 1889. Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2003670712/.

UPDATE: July 6, 2020

Read Elizabeth R. Varon’s excellent “The Statue That Never Was,” on the Blog of the John L. Nau III Center for Civil War History, University of Virginia, July 6, 2020, https://naucenter.as.virginia.edu/blog-page/1231.

Varon explores the fascinating story of the National Emancipation Monument, conceived but never built. She writes: “In this monument—which lived a brief evocative life in words and images, though it never took the form of granite and bronze—a black Civil War officer, André Cailloux, stood at the apex with white politicians arrayed at the base. The story of this project, and of its principal champion George W. Bryant, challenges us to reimagine how we remember and represent the Civil War.”

UPDATE: July 10, 2020

“Over the past few weeks, there has been extensive debate across the U.S. about statues depicting the Confederacy and other troubled aspects of American history. In the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Washington, D.C., the Emancipation Memorial – also known as the Freedman’s Memorial -- is one such symbol. Jeffrey Brown talks to four Black Americans to gauge differing views on the structure.”

PBS NewsHour, “These Black Americans See a Statue Memorializing Lincoln in Different Ways,” July 10, 2020, https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/how-black-americans-see-a-statue-memorializing-lincoln-in-different-ways.

UPDATE: September 8, 2021

Thomas Ball, Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln, 1876, Lincoln Park, Washington, DC. Photo by Nicole Peppe, September 8, 2021

Robert Berks, Mary McLeod Bethune Memorial, 1974, Lincoln Park, Washington, DC. Photo by Nicole Peppe, September 8, 2021

On September 8, 2021, Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln and the Mary McLeod Bethune Memorial were vandalized. On the base of the Bethune memorial, the vandal wrote “Lincoln Did Not Free The Slaves.” Unfortunately, the person(s) seemed to not know the importance of Bethune’s work as an educator and founder of the National Council of Negro Women. The National Park Service showed up quickly to power wash the paint from the monuments.

Thomas Ball, Freedmen’s Memorial to Abraham Lincoln, 1876, Lincoln Park, Washington, DC. Photo by Nicole Peppe, September 8, 2021.

This cardboard sign was left at the base of the memorial on September 8 as well. The cardboard sign reads: “Admirable as is the monument by Mr. Ball in Lincoln’s Park, it does not, as it seems to me, tell the whole truth . . . there is room in Lincoln Park for another monument. —Frederick Douglass, 1876”, #morehistory2021

UPDATE: January 15, 2022

Thomas Ball (1819 - 1911), Emancipation Group, 1865. Bronze. 33 in. x 24 in. x 16 in. (83.82 cm x 60.96 cm x 40.64 cm). The Lunder Collection, Colby Museum of Art, Colby College, Watertown, Maine

In October 2021, I had the pleasure of visiting Professor Tanya Sheehan’s class at Colby College. For their final paper assignment, the students in her class, Slavery and Freedom in American Art, engaged and critically reframed the Emancipation Group in the Colby Museum of Art. We had a great session in the museum looking at and discussing the work. This small cast/iteration departs iconographically from the monument in Washington, DC. In this version, we see the image of the enslaved man, still kneeling with broken manacles on his wrist, but wearing a Phrygian or liberty cap. Lincoln still stands above the Black figure, but no longer holds the unfurled Emancipation Proclamation. Instead, Lincoln’s hand rests on a shield atop a stack of four large books. Inscribed on the base, unlike the monument in Lincoln Park, are the words: “And upon this act—I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind and the gracious favour of Almighty God.”

Numerous small versions of the Emancipation Group exists in bronze and marble with slightly different use of symbolic imagery. Below is an example from the Chazen Museum of Art (formerly the Elvehjem Museum of Art) at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, which more directly references the 1876 monument.

Thomas Ball, Emancipation Group, 1873, marble. Chazen Museum of Art (formerly the Elvehjem Museum of Art), University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin

One of the most interesting things to come out of this visit was Professor Sheehan’s pointing to Ball’s writing on the sculpture. In his autobiography, My Threescore Years and Ten, Ball wrote that he used himself as the model for the “nude slave”!

“While waiting to find a studio (in Florence), I could not be idle, but in one of the spare rooms in my apartment I began a study, half-life size, of the “Emancipation Group,” which had been impatiently bubbling in my brain ever since the horrible tidings in Munich (news of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln on April 14, 1865). When I came to the modeling of the nude slave, I had some difficulty in finding a good life model. I had one, two or three times; but he was not good enough to compensate for the unpleasantness of being obliged to conduct him through our apartment. So, as it was warm weather, I decided to constitute myself both model and modeller. By lowering the clay so that I could work upon it while in a kneeling position (that of the slave) and placing a looking-glass on each side of me, I brought everything quite conveniently before me. As I did not require an Apollo for a model, but one who could appreciate exactly the position I required, and could not only see, but feel the action of each muscle, I could not have had a better one,—certainly for the money. At any rate, I succeeded in making one of the best of my nude figures, though under difficulties.”

—Thomas Ball, My Threescore Years and Ten: An Autobiography

Ball’s writings reveal several things. First, Ball conceived of the ‘Emancipation Group’ in response to the news of Abraham Lincoln’s assassination in April 1865. Second, after settling in Florence, Italy, in the same month, he purported to have difficulties finding a good life model, so he used his own physiognomy and body as the model for the “slave.” Third, he writes that the model “was not good enough to compensate for the unpleasantness of being obliged to conduct him through our apartment.” This comment suggests Ball’s own biases regarding working class models in Florence, perhaps one needed to be beautiful in order to enter the sanctity of his home.

NY State Network to Freedom: Harriet Tubman Statue and Equal Rights Heritage Center, Auburn

The final stop on my travels along the NY State Network to Freedom was a return to Auburn to visit the Harriet Tubman Commemorative Statue and the newly opened New York State Equal Rights Heritage Center. Created by Brian Hanlon, the seven-and-half foot tall (2.3 meters) bronze statue represents a young Harriet Tubman, traveling on the Underground Railroad. Clothed in nineteenth-century shawl, jacket, and pleated skirt, Tubman strides forward with her booted foot visible below the hem of her skirt. She extends her left hand behind her as if signaling to an invisible group to follow closely on the arduous route to Canada. In her right hand, she holds the ring of a lantern, illuminating the pathway to freedom.

Brian Hanlon, Harriet Tubman Commemorative Statue, 2019, Equal Rights Heritage Center, Auburn, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, October 2019.

The larger-than-life size statue forms a weighty pyramid, with Tubman’s wide skirt anchoring the composition. Her arms break the horizontal plane of the polyhedron. Given Tubman’s significance to Auburn, she lived on a farm in the town and is buried in Fort Hill Cemetery, a commemorative statue to her makes sense. The monument does what it is supposed to do: it emphasizes her corporeal presence in the landscape, and it points to the area’s rich connection to the Underground Railroad and the fight for freedom and equal rights.

Brian Hanlon, Harriet Tubman Commemorative Statue, 2019, Equal Rights Heritage Center, Auburn, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, October 2019.

Upon encountering the statue, I was immediately struck by the youthfulness of Tubman’s portrait—in many public monuments she is depicted as an older woman. Hanlon has said that he aspired to portray Tubman’s “strength and courage as a young warrior.” The sculptor modeled Tubman with a broad forehead, almond shaped eyes with carved pupils, a wide nose, and full lips. Tubman wears short natural hair, wrapped in a piece of cloth. Her expression and posture conveys her strength of character and body (despite her small stature and disabled body).

Similar to the other statues that I saw on my trip across Central New York, Hanlon utilizes figuration rooted in the classical past. Over and over again, I am finding that communities prefer (or perhaps negotiate) representation over abstraction, and the visually accessible over the conceptual. They want realism and the weight of bronze with the assurance of the statue’s legibility and longevity for future generations.

Brian Hanlon, Detail of lantern from Harriet Tubman Commemorative Statue, 2019, Auburn, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, October 2019.

Brian Hanlon, Detail of haversack and pistol from Harriet Tubman Commemorative Statue, 2019, Auburn, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, October 2019.

Three details on the monument narrate the monument. The lantern in Tubman’s right hand shines the way for freedom seekers and is also used as the logo for the Equal Rights Heritage Center, suggesting that the light of liberty and justice will always shine from New York State. On her left shoulder, Tubman carries a haversack that is tightly belted. Widely used during the American Civil War, the haversack reminds me of Tubman’s service as a nurse and scout during the war. Behind the haversack and tucked into the belt of her jacket is the butt of a revolver. Tubman’s biographer, Sarah H. Bradford, described that Tubman carried the revolver to encourage freedom seekers to keep moving forward.

“By night she traveled, many times on foot, over mountains, through forests, across rivers, mid perils by land, perils by water, perils from enemies, ‘perils among false brethren.’ Sometimes members of her party would become exhausted, foot-sore, and bleeding, and declare they could not go on, they must stay where they dropped down, and die; others would think a voluntary return to slavery better than being overtaken and taken back, and would insist upon returning; then there was no remedy but force.”

— Sarah H. Bradford, Scenes from the Life of Harriet Tubman, 1869

Equal Rights Heritage Center, Auburn, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, October 2019.

The statue of Harriet Tubman is placed across the plaza, slightly removed from the main entrance of the Equal Rights Heritage Center. The statue and the Center are co-dependent, meaning that the two are interconnected and emphasize the idea of hard earned freedom and equal rights. Upon arriving at the Center, I have to admit that had no idea of its purpose. I anticipated a museum dedicated to Tubman, and the history of Auburn and abolitionism.

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Entrance with introductory text panel, Equal Rights Heritage Center, Auburn, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, October 2019.

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Entrance with lantern logo, Equal Rights Heritage Center, Auburn, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, October 2019.

What I found at the Equal Rights Heritage Center was something totally different: a expansive visitor center with interactive maps and videos, the “Seeing Equal Rights in New York State” exhibit, as well as a Taste NY Market, where visitors can purchase state-produced items.

The exhibition text panel above the visitor information desk reads:

“New Yorkers have always led the way. In New York State, we’re proud to embrace our differences. We are all New Yorkers, and we are strong because we are diverse. Whether we’ve been here one day or our whole lives, we all belong. Our voices matter here, our rights our protected, and our differences are celebrated. In our storied history in the fight for the abolition of slavery and our important role in the Underground Railroad, to the start of the women’s right movement, to the birth of the modern LGBTQ rights movement, New Yorkers have always been at the forefront of the fight for a more inclusive world. Within this “Seeing Equal Rights in New York State” exhibition you will find inspiration and strength in the leadership New Yorkers have played in furthering freedom. We invite your to explore the people and places of New York that have made an impact on the continuous pursuit of equal rights within this exhibition, and across our great state.”

— Entrance text panel, Equal Rights Heritage Center, 2018

At its core, the center is about promoting tourism for Central New York, with a stress on the state’s progressive history in relation to women’s rights, abolitionism, civil rights, and LGBQT rights. It is not a traditional museum but rather a place to gather information in order to travel to other historic sites, parks, and museums.

Click on the image above to activate the slide show.

On several of the walls, visitors encounter rows of portraits of diverse women and men of New York who fought locally and nationally for equal rights, including images of nineteenth-century abolitionists Harriet Tubman, William Seward, Garret Smith, Frederick Douglass, and Sojourner Truth. All portraits include quotations.

Social Justice Table, Equal Rights Heritage Center, Auburn New York. Photographs by ©James Ewing/OTTO, see nARCHITECTS, http://narchitects.com/work/heritage-center/.

I stopped briefly at the Social Justice Table — a round table with tablets that contain history of the various equal rights sites. The Center also includes an immersive map video that highlights different types of “attractions” across the state including historic homes, Underground railroad sites, and interpretive centers.

Broadsides, Banners, Handbills, and Posters Exhibit, Equal Rights Heritage Center, Auburn, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, October 2019.

Along with the Social Justice Table and the video map, the Center includes several montages of reproduced posters, broadsides, banners, and handbills. These images range from a broadside announcing an anti-slavery mass meeting, a poster trumpeting “Votes For Women 1915,” a broadside heralding a “Malcolm X Commemoration Day”, and an AIDS poster declaring “Silence = Death.” I thought these the most effective visual elements of the exhibition.

At the end of my circuit through the Center, I was left thinking about equal rights and cultural heritage as tourism and about New York State boosterism. As seen in the exhibit, videos, and interactive map, New York is deemed a historic progressive state with progressive citizens. The narratives at the Center leave no room for the difficult and contentious aspects of the state’s history, including slavery. Feeling slightly disappointed, I left the Center and crossed over the plaza to take a tour of the Seward House Museum.

Click on the image above to activate the slide show with images of the Seward House Museum and the “Forged in Freedom” exhibition.

A graduate student in history gave a small group of us a thoughtful, historical tour. Rather than a discussion of objects, he built a context for the Sewards’ lives over time. In the basement of the house, “Forged in Freedom: The Bond of the Seward Tubman Families” is an excellent exhibition about the relationship between Harriet Tubman and the Sewards. The mansion was a safehouse on the Underground Railroad. Stationmaster Frances Adeline Miller Seward, William Seward’s wife, hid freedom seekers in the basement kitchen. Together, the house tour and the exhibition delivered a nuanced story of two families engaged in personal relationships and their mutual fight against slavery.

NY State Network to Freedom: Frederick Douglass Monument, Rochester

Rochester was my next stop on the New York State Network to Freedom to see the Frederick Douglass Monument (1899). A typical example of Beaux-Arts portrait sculpture in bronze, the eight-foot tall (2.4 meters) statue rests atop a nine-foot tall (2.7 meters) Westerly blue granite base. It is thought to be the first public monument to an African American in the United States.

Stanley W. Edwards, Frederick Douglass Monument, 1899, Highland Park Bowl, Rochester, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, September 2019.

Four bronze plaques adorn the pedestal, inscribed with Douglass’ words. Facing the monument to the south, the first plaque is marked in bronze capitalized lettering with the freedom fighter’s name: “Frederick Douglass.”

Moving counter clockwise, the east side of the plinth reads: “I know no soil better adapted to the growth of reform than American soil. I know of no country, where the conditions for effecting great changes in the settled order of things, for the development of right ideas of liberty and humanity are more favorable than here in these United States.” Extract from speech on Dred Scott Decision, delivered in New York, May 1857.

The north facing plaque is lettered with three quotes: “The best defense of free American institutions is the hearts of the American people themselves”; “One with God is a majority”; and “I know no rights of race superior to the rights of humanity.”

The east side of the plinth contains these words: “Men do not live by bread alone; so with nations, they are not saved by art, but by honesty; not by the gilded splendors of wealth, but by the hidden treasures of manly virtue; not by the multitudinous gratification of the flesh, but by the celestial guidance of the spirit.” Extract from speech on The West India Emancipation, delivered at Canandaigua, N.Y., August 4, 1857.”

Click on the image below to activate the slide show to view the four bronze plaques with Douglass’ words.

At the time of my visit on September 30, 2019, the Frederick Douglass Monument was located in Highland Park Bowl, above the park’s amphitheater, obscured by a grove of trees and hard to find. Originally, the statue was positioned in front of the old New York Central Train Station in downtown Rochester. It was moved to Highland Park in 1941 to be closer to where Douglass’ hillside farm stood on South Avenue. As of December 4, 2019, the city of Rochester relocated the monument to the newly created Frederick Douglass Memorial Plaza at the corner of South Avenue and Robinson Drive, a more prominent and accessible section of the park.

Stanley W. Edwards, Frederick Douglass Monument, 1899, Highland Park Bowl, Rochester, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, September 2019.

Originally intended to be carved in granite, Stanley W. Edwards created the statue that was ultimately cast in bronze. Edwards studied with the Danish-born Edward Ludwig Albert Pausch (1856-1931) in Buffalo, New York, and is best known for his granite Civil War memorials at Antietam National Battlefield in Sharpsburg, Maryland. At the time of the creation of the statue, he worked for the Smith Granite Company in Westerly, Rhode Island. Edwards used Frederick Douglass’s youngest son, Charles Redmond Douglass (1844-1920), as the model for the dignified portrait.

Below is a detail of the monument, and to the right, a photograph of Charles Edmond Douglass.

The solemnity of the imposing bronze figure of Douglass struck me immediately. The abolitionist and radical defender of liberty is shown with extended hand, engaged in oration. In one of the most important early books on American sculpture, Freeman Henry Morris Murray (Emancipation and the Freed in American Sculpture, 1916) wrote the following words about the Douglass statue:

“The pose is dignified and commanding. It is intended to portray the attitude of the distinguished orator as he stood before a large concourse of people in Cincinnati and made his first public address after the final ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment. We can well imagine that we hear him saying in a tone of sober triumph: ‘Fellow Citizens: I appear before you tonight for the first time in the more elevated position of an American citizen.’ Those who knew Douglass well will appreciate the strength of this work. It is not merely a man with such and such physical features, it is markedly personal, and clearly represents a person of more than ordinary force and commanding presence (107-108).”

“Exhibit on American Negroes at the Paris Exposition,” 1900, Library of Congress, Washington, DC. Illustration in: The American Monthly Review of Reviews, vol. XXII, no. 130 (1900 November), p. 576.

Interestingly enough, I first encountered the sculpture as a reproduction through the above photograph while I was researching my dissertation on Meta Warrick Fuller (1877-1968). W. E. B Du Bois included the statuette in his famous “Exhibit on American Negroes” for the Paris Exposition of 1900. Du Bois placed the statuette on a shelf, seen on the left in the photograph above the low bookcases.

The Frederick Douglass Monument continues to have resonance for artists and communities in the twenty-first century. In 2018, the Rochester-based artist, Olivia Kim, reproduced Edwards’ statue in fiberglass. In honor of the 200th anniversary of Douglass’ birth (1818), thirteen of these statues were placed around the city at significant historic sites. Imagined through Re-Energizing the Legacy of Frederick Douglass project, the fiberglass statues are part of “a public art project, exhibition, and community-wide reflection commemorating” Douglass. I encountered four of the thirteen statues during my visit: one located at 999 South Avenue, the former site of the Douglass farm and Underground Railroad site, and now, outside the Anna Murray-Douglass Academy, School No. 12; one in the Mount Hope Cemetery, where Douglass is buried; one at the intersection of Corinthian and State Streets in downtown Rochester, where Douglass delivered his famed “What to a Slave is the Fourth of July” (July 5, 1852); and one at Kelsey’s Landing in Maplewood Park along the Genesee River, where Douglass fled Rochester by boat to Canada after John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry, West Virginia (October 1859).

Click on the image below to activate the slide show to see four of Olivia Kim’s fiberglass statues of Frederick Douglass.

I found the immediacy and “lightweight” nature of these reproductions at odds with the monumentality and gravitas of the Edwards bronze statue. This is not a bad thing, I think. Kim’s use of pigment, sometimes bright hues, brings the life-size scale of the fiberglass statues into our contemporary world.

Murals at the School No. 12 and the Frederick Douglass Community Library, Rochester, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, September 2019.

Along with the fiberglass statue of Frederick Douglass, another local artist, Shawn Dunwoody, created several community-sourced murals located on the walls of School No. 12 and the Frederick Douglass Community Library. These graphic images memorialize Douglass in a powerful visual manner with their bold use of color, design, and quotations. They function as day-to-day monuments to Douglass’ ideas for the students who attend School No. 12, for the community members who use the library, and for the citizens of Rochester.

Click on the image below to activate the slide show to see Shawn Dunwoody’s community-sourced murals at School No. 12.

Writing for WXXI News in June 2018, Tianna Manon details the scope of the community involvement in the mural project: “It’s not easy to bring together dozens of students, 100 cans of paint and a handful of artists to create a mural. But that’s exactly what community artist Shawn Dunwoody did this month. In honor of Frederick Douglass’ 200th birthday, Dunwoody, students and other artists and professionals came together to paint several wall-size murals at Rochester’s School 12, where Douglass’ home once sat. The murals depict portraits of Douglass alone and with other well-known historical figures such as Susan B. Anthony. Some of his quotes are also turned into art on the walls. . . . ‘Here at Frederick Douglass’ home, we worked with students to create this idea of home and we tell the story of the Underground Railroad,’ Dunwoody said.”

NY State Network to Freedom: Freedom Crossing Monument, Lewiston

After five months, I am back at my blog post (let’s just say day-to-day life interceded and the COVID-19 epidemic has me in one place with plenty of time). I’m going to wrap up the New York State Network to Freedom posts with a look at the Freedom Crossing Monument in Lewiston; the Frederick Douglass Monument and all things Douglass in Rochester; and the Harriet Tubman Statue at the Equal Rights Cultural Heritage Center in Auburn.

Lewiston Landing, New York. Looking west across the Lower Niagara River to Canada. Photograph by Renée Ater, September 2019.

Seven miles north of Niagara Falls, Lewiston, New York, played an important role in the Underground Railroad. Located along a narrow section of the Lower Niagara River, boats made their way west across the river, transporting freedom seekers to Canada.

Susan Geissler, Freedom Crossing Monument, 2009, Lewiston, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, September 2019.

Created by local artist Susan Geissler, The Freedom Crossing Monument is located along the river at Lewiston Landing. The monument is an interesting conflation of fiction and history. It honors Margaret Goff Clark’s children’s novel Freedom Crossing (1969), and it memorializes the real Underground Railroad that ran across western New York, highlighting the efforts of station master Josiah Tryon (1798-1886).

Click on the image below to activate the slide show.

The heroine of Goff’s novel is Laura Eastman, a fifteen-year-old living in the 1850s, who finds herself deeply conflicted about slavery. After living with her aunt and uncle (pro-slavery advocates) in Virginia for four years, she returns to her family’s farm outside Lewiston. She soon discovers that her brother and father are involved in the Underground Railroad, sheltering fugitives from slavery in their home. Transformed by the plight of Martin Paige, a thirteen-year-old freedom seeker from North Carolina who arrives at her family’s Underground Railroad station, Laura commits to helping him across the Niagara River to Canada, forever transforming her understanding of slavery, humanity, and family.

Susan Geissler, Statue of Laura Eastman with an anonymous male (One More River to Cross) from Freedom Crossing Monument, 2009, Lewiston, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, September 2019.

Laura is shown at the apex of the monument, standing atop a small hill of granite. Dressed in her brother’s clothing (per the novel) with a long braid down her back, the teenager wears an urgent expression on her face as she assists an older African American, whom the artist identifies as “One More River to Cross.” With extended arm, Laura points with her right index finger across the Niagara River to Canada. Her left hand hovers over the freedom seeker’s back, encouraging him forward. Holding a cane in his hand, the African American male is ready to move forward. The dynamic gestures and expressions of the two cast figures convey the urgency of their mission.

Susan Geissler, Statue of Josiah Tryon, anonymous mother (Five Hundred Feet to Freedom) and child from Freedom Crossing Monument, 2009, Lewiston, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, September 2019.

The artist organized the second grouping of the Freedom Crossing Monument around a row boat. This part of the monument recognizes the dedication of the historic Underground Railroad station master Josiah Tryon. The bronze figure of Tryon stands with with one foot on the symbolic rocky shore of the Niagara River, and the other foot on the bottom the row boat. In his extended hands, he holds a young African American child. Seated in the boat, a desperate mother (“Five Hundred Feet to Freedom”) leans forward and reaches for her child, a modeled expression of alarm and anguish.

Click on the image below to activate the slide show and to see Josiah Tryon reenactor Timothy Henderson.

As no historic photographs exists of Tyron, his portrait is based on the visage of local Tryon reenactor Timothy Henderson. While I was visiting the First Presbyterian Church in Lewiston, I ran into Henderson who was conducting a television interview at the historic cemetery behind the church. The uncanny serendipity of meeting Henderson had me wondering about the use of models for the monument. The two adult African Americans remain anonymous, mythic in their representation of the ideals of freedom and the Underground Railroad: “One More River to Cross” and “Five Hundred Feet to Freedom.” The young child’s representation suggests stereotype.

Susan Geissler, Statue of child from Freedom Crossing Monument, 2009, Lewiston, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, September 2019.

I have been stuck on the image of the young child in this monument and the modeling of her hair. I see a caricature of the pickaninny (also picaninny, piccaninny or pickinninie), a derogatory image of the black child as wild and untameable. First realized in the character of Topsy from Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852), the image continues to have surprising currency. The baby’s distressed expression suggests real emotion but nonetheless I am pulled up short by the caricature residing in the bronze. Someone recently suggested to me that the hairstyle is a real one, derived from African hairstyles, and the representation is more ambiguous. I’m not sure I agree—I’m wrestling with the idea that the black figures in this monument appear to be types rather than portraits.

Pickaninny souvenir card. Copyright by E.C. Kropp Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Uncle Tom’s Cabin Co. “Topsy.” Library of Congress, https://lccn.loc.gov/2014637437

The image of the mother in the boat bears striking resemblance to Harriet Tubman (1822-1913). Geissler included a figure of Tubman in the original monument design. Then a controversy arose between leaders in Lewiston and Niagara Falls over who had the right to “claim” Tubman in monumental form. As Tubman never came through Lewiston, she was omitted from the final monument design. However, hidden within the folds of the woman’s dress are the words ““Mourn the Rainbow Heart,” a reference to Tryon, and an anagram that reads “We honor Harriet Tubman.”

Susan Geissler, Statue anonymous mother (Five Hundred Feet to Freedom) from Freedom Crossing Monument, 2009, Lewiston, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, September 2019.

According to the Buffalo News (May 21, 2016), the other four figures also include secret codes.

“On the father slave’s left pant leg are the words, “Though some may fail, those who try on and on will succeed. Sometimes folly leads to freedom and the rabbit escapes from the trap.” This is a quote from the Freedom Crossing novel and a play on the words “try on and on,” which refers to Tryon. The novel’s ISBN number is found on the inside of the coat of the statue depicting the young Eastman. On the baby’s shoe is found Exodus 5.1, which refers to the biblical verse, “Let my people go.” And, the GPS coordinates for Tryon’s grave in the Lewiston Cemetery are etched on the pant leg of this humble local hero.”

Susan Geissler, Freedom Crossing Monument, 2009, Lewiston, New York. Photograph by Renée Ater, September 2019.

The Freedom Crossing Monument is a source of great pride for the town of Lewiston, as a recent 10th Anniversary celebration reveals. This civic pride and claiming of its historic role in the Underground Railroad is important. At the same time, I understand the monument to have similar problems to nineteenth-century monuments that rely on tropes of blackness with an unintentional slide to caricature.

For those of you interested in the production of this monument, watch this video of the casting of the Freedom Crossing Monument.

NY State Network to Freedom: Harriet Tubman in St. Catharines, Ontario

Click on the image below to activate the slide show.

After leaving Schenectady, I traveled to Kingston, Ontario, for the weekend. On Sunday, I drove around Lake Ontario to St. Catharines. From 1851 to 1858, Harriet Tubman lived in St. Catharines and attended the Salem Chapel, British Methodist Episcopal Church (founded in 1855). The Salem Chapel was the first all-black church in the town. The City of St. Catharines now has two monuments to Tubman: one in the garden of the Salem Chapel; the other in the courtyard of the Harriet Tubman Public School. Canadian artist Frank Rekrut created both monuments: the portrait bust for Salem Chapel in 2010, the figure of a seated Tubman for the school in 2016.

Rekrut sourced his depiction from nineteenth-century photographs of Tubman. For the portrait bust, he turned to a well-known image of Tubman at mid-age by H. Seymour Squyer (National Portrait Gallery). Photographed against a light wall with pattern, Tubman looks directly into the camera. Her gaze is direct and strong. Wearing a checkered head wrap, a black dress, and black woven shawl, Tubman stands with her hands resting on her stomach. Squyer portrays a woman of strength and character.

Set in a meditation garden with white hydrangeas, the portrait bust at Salem Chapel sits atop a black granite plinth. Rekrut captures the same seriousness that we see in Squyer’s carte-de-visite. Etched in the granite are the following words: “Harriet Tubman. After the passing of the USA 1850 Fugitive Slave Law, she said ‘I wouldn’t trust Uncle Sam with my people no longer. I brought them all clear off to Canada.’” I appreciated the location of the memorial. A contemplative space with benches, visitors are encouraged to pause, to sit down, to view the memorial and garden, and to think about Tubman’s legacy. Despite the church’s location on a busy street, the garden was a quiet space for reflection.

For the statue at Harriet Tubman Public School, Rekrut favored an image of Tubman by W. H. Ernsberger from around 1900 (Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.) Aged 78 in the photo, Tubman is shown in three-quarters, turned at a slight angle to the picture plan. Staring directly at the camera, she sits in a wood armchair with her elbows resting on the arms and her hands crossed in her lap. Tubman wears a head wrap tucked behind her ears, a white linen scarf tied at the neck, a woven shawl, and a long, dark skirt.

Rekrut modeled a close likeness to Ernsberger’s photograph in a black bronze. Despite her own illiteracy, Tubman holds a book in both hands, a reminder to teachers and children of the importance of reading and learning. The sculpture is placed on a six-pointed star, and gold and silver stars with donor names decorate the string course that surrounds the statue.

Click on the image below to activate the slide show.

Watch the video below to learn about Frank Rekrut’s working method and a description of the casting process.

NY State Network to Freedom: Historic Vale Cemetery, Schenectady

After visiting the William Seward and Harriet Tubman Statue in downtown Schenectady, I drove less than a mile south to Historic Vale Cemetery.

Upon entering the cemetery from State Street, I encountered a peaceful picturesque park filled with trees and winding pathways. I took a few minutes to take in the quiet contemplative space.

With no sense of where I was headed, I drove down the main street of the cemetery in search of the African-American Ancestral Burial Ground. In particular I was looking for the headstone of Moses Viney (1817-1909) , who escaped from slavery on the Eastern Shore of Maryland to Schenectady on the Underground Railroad in April 1840. Viney then found employment with then-Union College president, Eliphalet Nott (1773-1866), as a coachman, messenger, and caretaker. Union College erected a headstone to Viney in 2009.

Click on the image below to activate the slide show.

With dumb luck and a left turn, I quickly found the African-American Ancestral Burial Ground and Viney’s gravesite. The information panel states that the burial ground is the “final resting place for abolitionists, Underground Railroad activist, advocates for African-American freedom, former slaves, war heroes, and people who were the fiber of Schenectady’s African-American community.” Originally located along Veeder Avenue and known as the “Colored Cemetery,” the burial ground was moved sometime between 1861 to 1863, with bodies exhumed and reburied in the new “Colored Plot” at Vale Cemetery.

Three men are singled out on the text panel: Viney, Richard P. G. Wright (ca. 1772-1847), and Corporal Jared Jackson (1840-1888). Wright, a barber by trade, was an abolitionist, an early member of the American Anti-Slavery Society, a founding member of the Anti-Slavery Society of the City of Schenectady, and active in the New York Committee of Vigilance. His headstone bears a Freemason square and compass; he and his son Theodore Sedwick Wright were the only African American members of the St. George’s Masonic Lodge in Schenectady. Viney’s grave is marked with a contemporary headstone embedded with a carved rose and the words “FREE” etched on a banner below the roses. Jackson served with Company N of the New York 20th Regiment of the United States Colored Troops. I could not locate Jackson’s headstone.

One of the most interesting headstones marked Jacob Robinson’s grave. Born around 1837, Robinson died in 1898 a member of the Grand United Order of Odd Fellows. Atop his headstone rests three linked circles, the official “logo” of the Odd Fellows, representing the ideals of friendship, love, and truth

As I moved further back into the burial ground, I realized something was amiss. I discovered that six headstones had been vandalized, pushed completely off their bases. Behind a screen of arbor vitae, to the right of the trees in the picture below, beer cans lay discarded on the ground.

Feeling dismayed at this desecration, I took a moment to breathe. The damaged graves include the following:

✪ Reverend Albert Johnson, 1852-1926, Troop K, New York 10th Regiment, U.S. Cavalry. At Rest.
✪ William Childers, Company F, New York 26th Regiment, United States Colored Troops, Died August, 25, 1890, Aged 49 Years.
✪ Mother, Anna Dunbar, 1858-1924
✪ Gertrude Elizabeth, daughter of Charlotte Wilson, July 9, 1907 - April 11, 1924
✪ Schuyler Fraser, 1870-1929

Click on the image below to activate the slide show.

In recent years, several journalists have written about the demise of historic black cemeteries and the lack of funding to preserve them including Dawn Olney, Jerrel Floyd, Brian Palmer, and Seth Freed Wessler. In February 2019, Representative Alma S. Adams (D-NC) and Representative A. Donald McEachin (D-VA) introduced H.R. 1179, which would establish within the National Park Service the African-American Burial Grounds Network. The goal is to document, preserve, and intepret historic African American cemeteries. The NPS has pushed back against the act, citing a lack of resources: “locating and protecting these sites while also developing the Network in all the ways the bill describes would be incredibly challenging and costly.”

I simply note that to do this kind of damage in a historically designated African American cemetery, takes a hate-filled heart and a deep disrespect for the African Americans buried in this place.

NY State Network to Freedom: William Seward and Harriet Tubman Statue, Schenectady

On Friday morning, September 27, I continued my trip from Albany to Troy and Schenectady. I was particularly interested in seeing the recently installed William Seward and Harriet Tubman Statue, Historic Vale Cemetery, and the African-African Ancestral Burial Ground within the cemetery. Later in the afternoon, I headed to Kingston, Ontario. From Kingston, I drove the perimeter of Lake Ontario on the Canada side, arriving in St. Catharines on Sunday late afternoon (Toronto, you hands down win the award for the worst traffic. Wow. You make Interstate 10/405 in Los Angeles look like baby’s play!)

City officials dedicated the William Seward and Harriet Tubman Statue on May 17, 2019, at the corner of Clinton and Liberty Streets in downtown Schenectady. Frank Wicks, an emeritus mechanical engineering professor at Union College, initiated the fundraising efforts to create the monument. Local artist, Dexter Benedict, was commissioned to create the life-size figures in bronze standing on Mohawk Valley dolostone surrounded by native plants.

The monument honors the friendship between the two. Seward (1801-1872) was a New York State Senator, Governor of New York, a United States Senator, and served as Secretary of State under both the Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson administrations. He is credited with spearheading the purchase of the Alaskan Territory from Russia in 1867. Tubman (1822-1913) is best known for her role as a conductor on the Underground Railroad; she made thirteen trips to the Eastern Shore of Maryland and brought approximately seventy people (family and friends) to freedom in St. Catharines, Canada West (Ontario). During the American Civil War, Tubman served as a Union spy, scout, and nurse. After the war, she played an important role fighting for black equality and women’s suffrage.

Both Tubman and Seward had ties to Schenectady. Tubman is known to have come through Schenectady after the famed Charles Nalle Rescue in Troy. Seward attended Union College and graduated from the school in 1820. Besides this connection to Schenectady, Tubman and the Sewards had a relationship based in their mutual fight against slavery. During the 1850s, Seward’s home in Auburn, NY, served as an important stop on the Underground Railroad with Seward’s wife, Frances (1839-1865), actively engaged in the abolitionist network and hid freedom seekers in her basement. In 1859, Tubman purchased a seven acre farmstead in Auburn from the Sewards, where she was based until her death in 1913. The relationship between them lasted until Frances’s and then William’s death. During the Civil War, Frances provided shelter to Tubman’s niece (speculation that she might have been Tubman’s daughter), Margaret Stewart. Immediately after the war, William advocated that Tubman should receive a government pension for her service as a scout and nurse in the U.S. Army.

Placed in front of the Schenectady County Public Library, the statue shows Seward and Tubman striding forward with Seward holding a cane and Tubman carrying a long walking stick. Both are dressed in nineteenth-century clothing, with their faces and poses based on historic photographs. Perhaps the oddest element of the statue is the embrace. Seward reaches his left arm around Tubman’s bronze back but does not touch her. Depicted with her right hand gesticulating upward, Tubman appears to be striding away from Seward. Although not intended by the artist nor those who commissioned the statue, I can’t help but read the gesture as one of paternalism: the white male savior guiding the black woman along the correct path. I’ll have to think about this more deeply but for now I see an incongruity between the statesman and the diminutive freedom fighter.

While I was standing in front of the monument, an African American couple in their early twenties came by to take photos. The young man pointed out the revolver to me and delivered an accurate history of Tubman’s work on the Underground Railroad. I say accurate because I often meet people at monuments who tell me fantastical things about them. The young man told me her gun made her “radical.” Indeed, it did. For visitors to the statue, it is a reminder that Tubman was tough. Its presence reminds us that she carried a fire arm to protect those she led to freedom and in her role as a scout during the Civil War.

For a discussion about the William Seward and Harriet Tubman Statue and the dedication ceremony, select the video below: “Wade in the Water: Unveiling of the Harriet Tubman - William Seward Statue.”

NY State Network to Freedom: Stephen and Harriet Myers Residence, Albany

So my plans to write weekly have gone a bit awry in September with a home remodeling project that expanded. I’m back and now on the road for a week in upstate New York, following parts of the New York State Network to Freedom—Underground Railroad. This trip was precipitated by a visit to see my good friend, Jennifer Strychasz, in Kingston, Ontario, and an invitation to speak at Colgate University in Hamilton, New York, on October 2. I continue to obsess over Harriet Tubman and her remarkable efforts to lead family and friends from the Eastern Shore of Maryland to upstate New York then onto St. Catharines, Ontario. I am amazed that she traveled nearly 800 miles by foot, boat, wagon, and train. A truly astonishing feat! I truly can’t complain from the confines of my air-conditioned car.

On Thursday evening, September 26, I arrived in Albany and had the opportunity for a tour of the Stephen and Harriet Myers Residence. The co-founders, Paul and Mary Liz Stewart, have done a remarkable job of spearheading the effort to restore the house and have run public programs from the house for twenty years including teen summer art programs. For me, their efforts exemplify community and civic engagement at its best. They are dedicated to making history meaningful in the present, and bringing it forward for school-aged youth. The Stewarts also manage the Underground Railroad History Project, another means by which they bring the history the Underground Railroad in upstate New York to the public.

Stephen and Harriet Meyers were prominent leaders of the Underground Railroad in Albany during the 1850s. Harriet Tubman came through their home on her travels through the state, and received invaluable assistance from them. Through the interior of the house, the Stewarts promote not only the telling of the life histories of the Meyers but the walls are lined with murals created by local teenagers that connect the past to the present. On two lots adjacent to the property, students created two gardens in honor of members of the community: Stephen Nelson Foster and Dr. Thomas Elkins.. After my visit, I am reminded that it is often dedicated individuals in local communities who insist that difficult histories should not be forgotten and should be included in the larger narrative of state and national histories.

Stay tuned as I blog about monuments and sites in Schenectady, Lewiston, Rochester, and Auburn as well as St. Catharines, Ontario.

Slavery and Montpelier: Part II

“We have seen the Mere Distinction of Colour made in the most enlightened period of time, a ground of the most oppressive dominion ever exercised by man over man.”

James Madison wrote these words in 1787, acknowledging that phenotype had allowed men of European descent to enslave Africans in an economic regime of subjugation and terror. This quotation is the fulcrum of the interactive exhibition “The Mere Distinction of Colour.”

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Brick mosaic of young enslaved boy constructed out of brick pieces excavated from the South Yard. Some of the shards contained fingerprints of the brick makers. Created by Proun Design, The Montpelier Foundation. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

Archaeology is an important tool for retrieving “the hidden lives” of those enslaved at Montpelier, according to Kat Imhoff, President and CEO of the Montpelier Foundation. Montpelier received a four-year grant (2010-2014) from the National Endowment of the Humanities to excavate, analyze, and interpret slave housing at Montpelier. Much of the interpretation in this exhibition is tied to this archaeological work.

Select the video below to watch the story of the excavations of the slave quarters at Montpelier.

Archaeology and Slavery: Slave Quarters Excavation at James Madison’s Montpelier. NEHgov, published October 21, 2013.

The interactive exhibition is located in the South Yard (see blog post: Slavery and Montpelier, Part I) and the South and North Cellars of James and Dolly Madison’s home. The cellars were used for storage and acted as an important social space called a “servants hall.” Emotionally powerful, the exhibition traces two narrative arcs in the cellars: “The Montpelier Story of Slavery as Told by Living Descendants” and “The National Story of Slavery & the Economic Impact of the Institution.” We entered through the South Cellar, and encountered whitewashed walls with the names of slaves stenciled on the wall at chest level. This unsettling site of the names running around the course of the room—particularly the stenciled “Name Unknown”—provoked me to think of the countless times these men and women entered these spaces to serve the Madisons, yet they were not acknowledged or recorded as existing in any significant way.

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Names listed on wall in South Cellar, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

The South Cellar focuses intently on the lives of the slaves at Montpelier. With clear and thoughtful language, all of the exhibition texts reminds visitors of the humanity of individuals. Yet, much of this content is not cogently translated into the house, where there is a mention of Paul Jennings, but no indication that slave labor constructed the house and that such labor was necessary for the day-to-day functioning of the house. Nothing functioned at Montpelier without slave labor. In fact, some visitors could avoid the issue of slavery at Montpelier completely by solely attending the “Signature Tour” or the “Madison and the Constitution Tour.” In the South Cellar, I observed one older white couple read the introductory label then exit quickly. I was reminded of the July Twitter storm and subsequent press coverage about a white woman who conveyed her extreme disappointment that the tour of a Louisiana plantation included a discussion of slavery. Some want narratives that avoid the harsh realities of chattel slavery, and stories that ignore slavery’s intertwined role in the founding of the nation. Montpelier would like visitors to wrestle with this legacy in real ways.

Click on the image below to activate the slide show.

“The Enslaved of Montpelier,” from The Mere Distinction of Colour exhibition, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

“Person or Property,” from The Mere Distinction of Colour exhibition, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

“Person or Property,” from The Mere Distinction of Colour exhibition, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

The declarative sentences on large hanging text panels assert the subjective life of enslaved persons. A particularly moving example framed the experience of a female slave:

I was a wife

I was separated

I was raped

I was afraid

I was hopeful

I was a survivor

I was property.

Although I came away with the notion of Madison as a “benevolent” slave owner after the house tour, these simple declarative sentences reminded me that there is zero benevolence in chattel slavery. These statements are part of a narrative in the South Cellar that points to the ugliness of slavery and the beauty of human resistance.

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“Person or Property,” from The Mere Distinction of Colour exhibition, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

In the final section of the South Cellar, visitors encounter a evocative video installation, “Fate in the Balance,” projected on the blank white washed walls of the cellar. Northern Light Productions, the makers of the film, used charcoal illustrated animation to tell the story of Ellen Stewart, who was born into slavery at Montpelier, and witnessed the separation of her family. It is a powerful tale of the destructive nature of slavery. As I watched the film, I found myself experiencing a range of emotions from sadness to horror to anger. The evocative use of charcoal haunts the South Cellar wall, the ghosts of the past ever present, their stories waiting to be told and retold.

Select the video below to watch a short segment of “Fate in the Balance.”

The North Cellar contains the story of slavery writ large, “The National Story of Slavery & the Economic Impact of the Institution.” This story is told through the idea of “America’s contradiction,” rather than moral or ethical hypocrisy. With detailed interactive panels, we learn of the economics of slavery, slavery and the American presidency, Madison’s opinions about and actions in regard to slavery, and slavery in the Constitution. I was impressed with the comprehensive yet straightforward texts panels. One of the most striking videos in the North Cellar exhibit uses an interactive map to show the growth of the domestic slave trade from the three top slave-selling states: Virginia, South Carolina, and Maryland. After the United States officially abolished the transatlantic slave trade in 1807, plantation owners sought new ways to sell and make profit off human beings. In measurable form, the interactive map details the movement of slaves to the Deep South; between 1824-1834, slave owners had sold nearly 300,000 slaves in the domestic slave trade, 25% of them children. This simple map with each dot representing a 1,000 people is a stunning visualization of the growth slavery in the United States.

Select the link to the interactive map or go directly to Proun Design for access to video.

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“Slavery in the Constitution,” from The Mere Distinction of Colour exhibition, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

The North Cellar exhibition ends on a powerful note with Northern Lights Production’s five-screen video, “Legacies of Slavery.” The film follows the impact of slavery on American society, tracing an arc from convict leasing to the Civil Rights Movement to contemporary police brutality and the rise the Black Lives Matter movement. At the beginning of the film, I was struck by one commentator’s remarks about our resistance to the messiness of history: “What we love is nostalgia. We love to remember things exactly the way they didn’t happen. And history itself is often an indictment.”

Select the video above to watch Chris Denemayer of Proun Design discuss his exhibition design “The Mere Distinction of Colour.”

Slavery and Montpelier: Part I

Recently, I had a discussion with a colleague about the problem of interpreting slavery at historic plantations in Virginia. We spoke specifically about Mount Vernon (George Washington), Gunston Hall (George Mason), Montpelier (James Madison), and Monticello (Thomas Jefferson). I was fascinated with her take that the curators and historians at these historic plantations still needed to expand and integrate slavery into the historic house tours. In her eyes, these institutions still had not done enough to interpret slavery as present in every aspect of daily life on the plantation, including the interior spaces of the main house.

Mount Vernon

Photo by Renée Ater

Gunston Hall

Montpelier

Photo by Renée Ater

Monticello

Photo by Renée Ater

Curious about Montpelier and its story of the enslaved community, I decided a visit was in order. I turned to Montpelier’s website to get a sense of its mission. The website states explicitly that the house museum is

“A memorial to James Madison and the Enslaved Community, a museum of American history, and a center for constitutional education that engages the public with the enduring legacy of Madison's most powerful idea: government by the people.”

This language surprised me and made me wonder what visitors thought about this declaration, and what they expected on the tours.

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Montpelier, Montpelier Station, Virginia. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

With my friend Yui Suzuki accompanying me, we arrived on site at 10:30 am. Since we had an hour to explore before the tour, we decided to begin with a walk to the slave cemetery. Located some distance from the main house, the slave cemetery is a field of periwinkle, grasses, and trees with no boundary walls or headstones. Although not visible under the greenery, forty depressions indicate former graves of the enslaved. According to the tour guide, archaeologists note that the depressions are a result of sinking coffins and soil settling; the historic cemetery has not been restored. Montpelier has conducted archaeological work with remote sensing and cadaver dogs to determine that bodies are indeed buried at the location, and are in discussions about next steps. I must admit that I was disappointed at the lack of extensive archaeological work at the site as such excavations are happening elsewhere at Montpelier. I imagine the Montpelier Foundation must have well-considered plans for future excavation at the Slave Cemetery similar to the archaeology programs at the Alexandria’s Contraband and Freedmen Cemetery Memorial and the Slave Cemetery at Mount Vernon.

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Slave Cemetery, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

Slave Cemetery, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

Slave Cemetery, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

Slave Cemetery, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

Due to our arrival time, we decided to take the hour-long “Montpelier Enslaved Community” walking tour first, which is offered only two times a day at 11:30 am and 3:00 pm. The walking tour began with an overview of the history and then wound its way through the South Yard, adjacent to the house. After the walking tour, we participated in the the traditional hour-long “Signature Tour,” which is offered on the hour and is a room-by-room biographical tale of James and Dolly Madison. Finally we explored “The Mere Distinction of Colour” exhibition in the cellars of the Madison home. By taking the enslaved community tour first, my understanding of the house significantly changed. The guide focused specifically on the role of slavery in all aspects of the plantation during the 17th and 18th centuries. In addition, she narrated the lives of several enslaved persons laboring at Montpelier. Where as the “Montpelier Enslaved Community” guide was direct in discussing the role of slavery at Montpelier and the fundamental contradictions of James Madison as a founding father and slave owner, the “Signature Tour” guide focused mostly on the biographies of the Madisons with a mention of their manservant, Paul Jennings..

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South Yard, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

The reconstructed, pristine white South Yard is where the enslaved at Montpelier lived and worked. The South Yard includes two double homes, a kitchen, and a smokehouse. The buildings have been rebuilt based on archaeology and insurance maps from the time. The interpretation of the South Yard—the slave quarters and work buildings—is excellent and offers the unique perspective of the descendants of the enslaved at Montpelier. Objects, photographs, and audio all give visitors a sustained sense of individuals who labored, loved, bore children, worshiped, engaged each other as community, and resisted in small and big ways the horrific system of chattel slavery. The exhibition designers included objects on wooden tables in each slave quarter, encouraging visitors to pick them up and handle.

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Slave Quarter, Montpelier. Created by Proun Design, The Montpelier Foundation. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

Slave Quarter, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

Interior Slave Quarter, Montpelier. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

Interview with Leontyne Peck, member of the Montpelier Descendants Community. PBS NewsHour, August 9, 2017.

Each building includes a window with the glass etched with the ghost-like forms of laboring black women. In rethinking the interpretation of slavery at the site, Montpelier staff decided to include the voices of the descendants with audio recordings in each slave quarter.

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Etched Window in Slave Quarter, South Yard, Montpelier. Created by Proun Design, The Montpelier Foundation. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

Photo Montage of portraits by Eduardo Montes-Bradley produced for The Mere Distinction of Colour, an exhibit at James Madison's Montpelier. Orange, Virginia. See https://vimeo.com/233047674.

The incorporation of the enslaved descendant voices is deeply affective. James Madison enslaved Rebecca Gilmore Coleman’s great-grandfather at Montpelier, and his descendants still live in the surrounding area. Listening to descendant voices such as Coleman’s, I came away with a sense of the pride that they felt about their ancestry, the deep commitment to their family histories, and the active role they play as stakeholders in the historical storytelling at the site.

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“The Taylors,” Slave Quarter, South Yard, Montpelier. Created by Proun Design, The Montpelier Foundation. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

Overall, the story of slavery at Montpelier is a powerful one and fully integrated throughout the site. My criticism lays with the consistent use of “contradiction” versus “hypocrisy” in describing James Madison’s attitudes towards democracy and slavery. Our tour guide told us not to judge Madison by the standards of our time because he was a “man of his time.” I disagree. Madison seemed fully aware that he held irreconcilable beliefs on freedom and slavery. He and the other founders created a republican form of government intertwined with the subjugation and enslavement of Africans. Even as we recognize their intellectual contributions to the nation, we cannot ignore their profound moral and ethical hypocrisy in maintaining chattel slavery for economic benefit.

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Thirteen of the first eighteen presidents were slave holders. The backlit portraits indicate slave owning presidents. This graphic is from “The Mere Distinction of Colour” exhibition in the cellar of the Montpelier. Created by Proun Design, The Montpelier Foundation. Photo by Renée Ater, August 2019.

StoryMapJS: Regional Monuments to Slavery →

I created this StoryMapJS for a lecture for the Smithsonian Associates in February 2019. The story map traces monuments in Maryland, District of Columbia, and Virginia. To take the tour: use the arrow on the story map, or click the arrow next to the blog title to go directly to a full screen version of the story map.

Created using the open source tool StoryMapJS, Knight Lab, Northwestern University, https://storymap.knightlab.com/.

StoryMapJS of Harriet Tubman Monuments →

In honor of the 106th anniversary of Harriet Tubman’s death on March 10, 1913, I created this story map of monuments dedicated to Harriet Tubman. To take the tour: use the red “take the tour” button, navigate using the arrow on the story map, or click the arrow next to the blog title to go directly to a full screen version of the story map.

Created using the open source tool StoryMapJS, Knight Lab, Northwestern University, https://storymap.knightlab.com/.

TimelineJS of Harriet Tubman Monuments →

It's International Women's Day (March 8, 2019). Check out my timeline of Harriet Tubman monuments in the United States. To navigate use the arrow on the timeline, or click the arrow next to the blog title to go directly to a full screen version of the timeline.

TimelineJS Embed

Created using the open source tool TimelineJS, Knight Lab, Northwestern University, https://timeline.knightlab.com/.

The Power of Remembrance: EJI National Memorial for Peace and Justice

Under the rain soaked skies, I visited EJI National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama.

As I walked up the gently sloped landscape, I found myself in a somber, funeral place of difficult history, of mourning and grief, and of powerful remembrance and reflection.

I am surprised at the strength of my emotion when I enter the memorial space. I cannot stop the tears from flowing and my heart aching. I am overwhelmed. The hanging rusted steel steles are a gut-wrenching reminder of black bodies hanging from trees. On each stele, I see the names of individuals and the dates of their murders. They represent the 4,000+ real human beings lynched systematically and with impunity by white citizens of the United States. I reach out to touch a name, tracing the laser-cut forms of the letters in an attempt to make tangible their presence. I lean into one of the stele seeking bodily connection. And I feel a sadness and anguish so powerful that it lashes deep into my psyche. Intellectually, I am surprised at my response. Yet, the emotional upheaval I feel is real and powerful: I am witness to what had been an unspoken and hidden holocaust of black men and women in the United States, and is now made visible

On this morning, it is hushed inside, voices muted and rain flowing like small streams off the roof. Around me, people search for the names of family members and distant relatives on the hanging tombstones, talking quietly to each other about their own personal histories of racial terror and violence.

I, too, search for a name: Mary Turner, Brooks County, Georgia, May 19, 1918.

While writing my dissertation on the sculpture of Meta Warrick Fuller in the late 1990s, I researched Mary Turner's lynching because Fuller created a small painted plaster to honor her memory. It is an ugly story, reported by the fearless and indomitable Walter F. White (then Assistant Secretary of the NAACP) in the pages of The Crisis magazine on September 18, 1918:

"At the time she was lynched, Mary Turner was in her eighth month of pregnancy. The delicate state of her health, one month or less previous to delivery, may be imagined, but this fact had no effect on the tender feelings of the mob. Her ankles were tied together and she was hung to the tree, head downward. Gasoline and oil from the automobiles were thrown on her clothing and while she writhed in agony and the mob howled in glee, a match was applied and her clothes burned from her person. When this had been done and while she was yet alive, a knife, evidently one such as is used in splitting hogs, was taken and the woman's abdomen was cut open, the unborn babe falling from her womb to the ground. The infant, prematurely born, gave two feeble cries and then its head was crushed by a member of the mob with his heel. Hundreds of bullets were then fired into the body of the woman, now mercifully dead, and the work was over."

How could white Americans participate in such heinous acts, bringing children and picnics as if attending sporting events? How is that we have allowed ourselves as a nation to deny this horrible legacy of white supremacy?

Meta Warrick Fuller, Mary Turner: A Silent Protest Against Mob Violence, 1919, painted plaster. Museum of African American History, Boston, Massachusetts.

As I exit the memorial, I come upon poet Elizabeth Alexander's Invocation and I am reminded that this history of terror will no longer be forgotten. It is anchored now in steel and concrete, water and earth, trees and sky.

Alison Saar's Swing Low

Welcome to my blog! In the coming months, I will post on objects related to my Contemporary Monuments to the Slave Past project as well as big ideas I need to sort out. For now, it will not be open for comments but feel free to like!

I selected Alison Saar's Swing Low: Harriet Tubman Memorial (2008) as my first blog post because it is such a powerful and compelling image, and I am currently obsessed with Harriet Tubman as a woman and as a historical figure. The first public monument to an African American woman in New York City, the statue is located at Harriet Tubman Square, formed at the intersection of St. Nicholas Avenue and Frederick Douglass Boulevard at West 122nd Street in Harlem.

The contrast between the verdigris patina of her coat and skirt and the slate black patina of her skin are visually striking. With a stoic expression and determined gaze (think Roman portrait bust), Tubman moves forward with the steam of a locomotive. The bottom of her skirt becomes the pilot of a train, sometimes called a cattle catcher, which was the device mounted at the front of a locomotive to deflect obstacles on the track that might derail the train. Embedded in her skirt are portraits of anonymous faces, the passengers of the Underground Railroad, as well as objects carried north by fugitive slaves including cowry shells, medicine bottles, time pieces, shoe souls, and the broken manacles of slavery.

Alison Saar, Swing Low: Harriet Tubman Memorial, dedicated November 13, 2008. 13 feet (H), bronze and Chinese granite. Photo by Renée Ater.

Trailing behind Tubman and attached to a boulder and her skirt are tree roots. These gnarled, intertwined roots represent Tubman's efforts to uproot the system of slavery and the "pulling up of roots by the slaves and all they had to leave behind." Along the base of the sculpture, Saar included bronze quilt blocks: traditional geometric quilt designs as well as applique blocks of scenes from Tubman's rescue efforts to the Eastern Shore of Maryland.

Frontispiece from Scenes in the Life of Harriet Tubman, ca. 1868. National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC.

I think that Saar 's conception of Tubman is based on the 1869 frontispiece from Sarah Bradford’s Scenes in the Life of Harriet Tubman. In June 1863, Tubman became the first woman to lead an armed military raid when she guided Col. James Montgomery and his 2nd South Carolina black regiment up the Combahee River, routing Confederate outposts, liberating more than 700 slaves, and destroying stockpiles of cotton, food, and weapons. Saar incorporated the core visual elements of the nineteenth-century wood engraving including the head wrap, the pleated skirt, and the Union army issued sack coat and haversack. Strikingly, Saar omitted the 1861 Springfield rifled musket. I speculate that Saar and city planners chose deliberately to omit the weapon because of the location of the memorial across from the 28th Precinct of the NYPD, and its long and difficult history of policing the once predominantly black Harlem. What would it have meant to have a statue of an armed black women in such a prominent public space?