So, what do you do when you operate a non-profit organization from your home, and a potential funder asks for a site visit? First, you revel in the fact that potential donors think that your organization is more than it is. Second, you notify the people who helped to get you to this point, your proposal writer, your development committee, and your board of directors to seek their guidance.
The Slave Dwelling Project envisions a future in which the hearts and minds of Americans acknowledge a more truthful and inclusive narrative of the history of the nation that honors the contributions of all our people, is embedded and preserved in the buildings and artifacts of people of African heritage, and inspires all Americans to acknowledge their Ancestors.
Magnolia Plantation and Gardens
After the consultation, the solution to the site visit was simple. Why not go to the first historic site that the Slave Dwelling Project applied this vision and where it has been applied the most since its inception in 2010? That site is Magnolia Plantation and Gardens in Charleston, SC. It was there on Mother’s Day, 2010, that I woke up in one of the restored slave cabins after spending the night there alone.
Magnolia Plantation
What started as a simple idea of spending nights in slave dwellings to honor the enslaved Ancestors, has now evolved. The Slave Dwelling Project has now conducted sleepovers and living history programs at historic sites with ties to chattel slavery in twenty-six states and the District of Columbia. This living history involves:
· Candid conversations about chattel slavery’s legacy
· Sleeping in slave dwellings at historic sites
· African American living historians in period dress demonstrating cooking, blacksmithing, brick making / telling stories / giving history lectures
We document this journey through the blogs that we write after each adventure. Here is a link to our last sleepover at Magnolia Plantation.
Tom Johnson, Director Magnolia Plantation
So, Tom Johnson, executive director of Magnolia Plantation and Gardens and Julie Hussey from the development committee, met a Boeing representative and me at Magnolia. Not only did we tour the slave cabins, but I also got a verbal commitment from the Boeing representative to join us in our next conversation and sleepover at Magnolia. In my experience, saying yes to the request to spend the night in a slave cabin is easy. Following through on that promise is the challenge. The action sounds useful to some, but once they consult others, they sometimes become convinced that they made the wrong choice. The propensity to not follow through with the commitment increases if the person committing is not African American. So, that was one of those frequent conversations that I walked away from saying if it happens, it happens, if not so be it.
Many historic sites have few if any African Americans in a decision-making capacity. Their interpretation of the historical presence of African Americans usually reflects that statistic. While some historic sites do a great job of interpreting the stories of those who were enslaved, there are still some sites that are new to that arena. Moreover, there are still some sites that still refuse to interpret the lives of enslaved people.
Nationally, the Slave Dwelling Project is helping to fill this void by conducting living history programs wherever we are invited. With living historians, the Slave Dwelling has traveled to the states of Alabama, Arkansas, Maryland, North Carolina, Texas, and Virginia. The living historians reside in the states of Georgia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. The living historians demonstrate hearth cooking, brick making, and blacksmithing, those activities enslaved people would have done on plantations or wherever they were enslaved. The demonstrations are interspersed with storytelling and history lectures.
Magnolia Plantation
The founder of the Slave Dwelling Project, Joseph McGill, resides in Ladson, SC, therefore, most of the activities of the Slave Dwelling Project have occurred in this state. In 2019, the Slave Dwelling Project conducted programs at:
· Howard AME Church, McClellanville
· Hampton Plantation, Charleston County
· Ashley Hall School, Charleston
· North Charleston High School
· Hobcaw Barony, Georgetown County
· St. Stephens Episcopal Church, Charleston
· Lexington County Museum
Also, in 2019, the Slave Dwelling Project conducted three living history programs at Magnolia Plantation and Gardens in Charleston in February, July, and October. Additionally, a program titled Let’s Talk Reconstruction: A Community Gathering was conducted at Magnolia Plantation and Gardens.
Assembling all or some of the living historians at any historic site is costly. This cost is prohibitive to some sites that can benefit from and seek our services.
The Employees Community Fund of Boeing has stepped up to help fill that void by granting $2000.00 to the Slave Dwelling Project. This fund will assist in defraying the costs of logistics and honorariums for living historians to participate in programs at historic sites in the Charleston, SC area.
This gift can be the difference in that one organization conducting a program at their site or not. These funds can enhance living history at sites by covering honorariums for living historians, covering travel costs of living historians, or covering their accommodations.
Boeing
The gift is timely because 2020 is the tenth anniversary of the Slave Dwelling Project’s existence. We are also in the process of determining the sites that the Project will visit in 2020. This gift ensures that the Charleston area will be well represented by the Slave Dwelling Project and its living historians in 2020. Stay tuned as we will release that schedule in two weeks.
Thank you Employee Community Fund of Boeing for assisting the Slave Dwelling Project in its effort to change the narrative and honor the enslaved Ancestors.
Oh yes, the Boeing representative did engage in the campfire conversation about slavery and the legacy it left on this nation, and yes, that representative did spend the night in a slave cabin.
We urge you to be like Boeing.