Posted on 05/14/2002 1:56:51 PM PDT by mondonico
Liberty Bell's new home will address slavery
George Washington kept slaves at the Phila. site. That must be recognized, the Park Service agreed.
By Stephan Salisbury
Inquirer Staff Writer
After a daylong meeting yesterday that effectively ended the controversy over the depiction of slavery at Independence National Historical Park, officials said that exhibits in and around the new Liberty Bell Center will discuss slavery as it once existed in Philadelphia and the nation.
As a result, the story of the Liberty Bell will acknowledge the nation's complex and contradictory roots in freedom and slavery, National Park Service officials said.
This represents a major departure from the current bell story told by park rangers, which focuses almost exclusively on the bell's presence during the Revolutionary War era, as a symbol taken up by abolitionists prior to the Civil War, and as an international symbol of freedom.
The new emphasis also represents a successful effort on the part of numerous historians and scholars who lobbied the Park Service to expand its discussion of the nation's roots in slavery using the rich history embedded in the soil of Independence Mall.
That history attracted wide public interest when it was reported that the bell's new home, under construction along the east side of Sixth Street between Market and Chestnut Streets, is near the house occupied by slave owner George Washington during his presidency from 1789 to 1797.
Washington quartered eight slaves behind the Market Street house, known as the Executive Mansion, and visitors to the bell will walk over ground where presidential slaves once lived and toiled. The house was demolished in the 1830s.
After yesterday's meeting, David Hollenberg, associate regional director for the Park Service, said the historians' comments would lead to a richer park experience.
"I believe we can accommodate this wonderful input... into the exhibit in a way that won't have serious implications for the budget or the schedule," Hollenberg said.
The entire Liberty Bell Center is expected to cost about $12.6 million.
"The historians wanted a meeting to speak with the Park Service about the interpretive possibilities at this site," said Randall Miller, a professor of American history at St. Joseph's University. "Many people thought we were losing the opportunity to expand the interpretation... and that we were losing stories especially important to America, in particular stories related to the struggle of freedom vs. unfreedom.
"The historians weren't there to provide text," Miller continued. "The whole dynamic of the meeting was to grab themes... to help visitors have a richer experience."
Dennis R. Reidenbach, assistant superintendent of Independence Park, said the Park Service would take the ideas tossed around at the meeting and come up with a means to bring them to life. That means reworking the interpretive ideas for the Liberty Bell Center to include a fuller discussion of slavery.
It also means fleshing out the outdoor interpretation of the Executive Mansion.
The Park Service has rejected the idea of reconstructing or outlining the first presidential residence - ideas broached by some scholars. Reidenbach and Hollenberg said an outline would probably prove confusing. They also said the exact floor plan of the house was still conjectural.
Still, they vowed, the mansion will not be slighted.
"It is clear this is a compelling story that visitors are interested in," Reidenbach said.
Park Service officials will try to come up with new broad interpretive plans over the next few weeks. More meetings with historians are possible, officials said.
"Nobody is scrapping anything," Miller said, alluding to the Park Service's plans. "We're looking at new thematic possibilities such as freedom and unfreedom as a principal theme that would course through the exhibition. Now it goes back to the Park Service."
If you want on (or off) of my black conservative ping list, please let me know.
In my opinion, the idea that suddenly, 137 years after slavery ended in America, it has become an issue where our justly beloved First President housed his household servants, while he was in Philadelphia, is nothing but a contrived attempt at creating a controversy, designed to undermine American images with the historically illiterate. This sort of thing has become all too common since Bill Clinton was elected President. I realize that we are supposed to be done with Clinton's policies, but this sure reeks of them. I would hope that the new Administration would reverse this decision of the Park Service.
William Flax Return Of The Gods Web Site
Unless you've just been beamed from Planet X, you've already heard this "compelling" story ad nausea!
They should add a postscript to this "compelling" story on how, a hundred years after slavery ended, the liberals covertly began to enslave the heirs of former slaves through their myriad of social programs.
I say Hell yes they should let people know about this. It just goes to show that times change.
If you try to make Washington, Jefferson (or Jeff Davis and Lincoln for that matter) into something they are not, or something more than they are, you are guilty of a lie or a sin of omission.
Obviously, slavery is not the most important issue on the site of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Buy when you think that less than 90 years later the Southern States would try to dissolve the Union set there over that very issue, it becomes an interesting footnote.
Hey, he had dentures, too. Why haven't we heard more about this? I demand a display of modern prosthetic dentistry compared to that of GW's day. The discrepancy has gone unreported for too long.
Maybe folks whose ancestors suffered from wearing wooden dentures should get reparations.
I wonder how much of this "compelling history" became more compelling to the activist historians when government $$$ came flowing into the area.
In Texas: remembering the Alamo differently
When kids can actually remember the basics (names, dates, places) then maybe add layers to the discussion. The communists wanted American school children to be taught such aspects to diminish their national pride. If the founding fathers weren't good people, then maybe the government they established isn't good for all people.
Does anyone make a point as to the freedom of the servants Richard The Lion Hearted took on the Third Crusade? How about the freedom of the servants that Charlemagne took to the Pyranees. Slavery was not seen primarily as a moral issue in 1789. Bondage in one form or another was an accepted part of the social structure going back to Biblical times.
The sole reason for this little controversy is to make Washington look less appealing to the historically illiterate, who do not understand the pre-industrial labor systems. In an era when absolutely no one is advocating returning to such systems, it is pure agitation, and nothing else.
William Flax Return Of The Gods Web Site
Anyone knows that slavery existed at the time of our nation's founding. How we interpret that is up to each of us. I think it's better to focus on the ideal, knowing that the reality for some was different, and then note how far things have come today.
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