Content note: slavery, racism
When I saw a news story about the Whitney Plantation, I was reminded of the conversation we had here about Ani DiFranco’s obnoxious and ill-conceived idea to have a retreat at a plantation, about how, if at all, a plantation could be used as a proper memorial to the black slaves on whose suffering such places depended upon. It seems that John Cummings has spent years in an effort to do just that. The website has not only pictures but links to various news articles about the restoration and Cummings’s decision to make this museum as a memorial/tribute to those who were enslaved.
From what I can tell, the museum’s admission and tours are free–no fees are listed on the website, and apparently Cummings’s is wealthy enough that he wouldn’t need to charge admission anyway. The articles are a little over-focused on the heroism of the white man in charge and not as much on the black scholars whose work inspired him and with whom he worked for my taste, but I’m guessing that’s not the museum’s fault.
What do you all think? Did Cummings do well? I was quite moved by many of the photographs, particularly those of the infants’ memorial and the wall dedicated to memorializing the slaves by name and I think that incorporating recordings of slaves’ own narratives of their lives was a vital step, to allow people so often silenced to speak for themselves. Apparently Cummings is also working with scholars to produce a database that would aid African-Americans in genealogy research. But I’ve been wrong before. I’m interested to hear the opinions of others here.