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The decision to remove
the Afrolumens Project from the web in September 2007 was based on my need
for time. I wanted to start writing the book that I'd been planning for several
years, and a website takes time to maintain. By taking it down, I was able
to write all but the final two chapters of that book, which I hope to finish
this winter. Taking the website down also helped me to regain a perspective
on the site's intended purpose that I had lost over the years as it grew
constantly larger and broader in scope. The new mission of the Afrolumens
Project is to tell the story of Central Pennsylvania's struggle with
slavery, antislavery, and all the issues engendered by that struggle. Before
the Afrolumens Project, I authored a much smaller website called "Slavery
in Pennsylvania," which was hosted on GeoCities. It was a subject about
which I was passionate, and still am. That initial offering to the world
wide web
is incorporated in the current Afrolumens Project, altough now much enlarged,
as the "Slavery" section. In writing
the book, I found that my passion for that chapter of local history was stronger
than ever, and included all of the slavery-related issues that
inflammed the Harrisburg area and the nation from colonial times through
the bloodbath that was the Civil War.
Don't worry, I will
not delete the 20th Century section of the website. There are many people
who
have a
strong interest in that material, and this is the only place much of it can
be found. It will be safely and permanently housed in the Afrolumens Archives,
where it may be accessed as usual. In the coming months, though, look for
the site to take on a different look and feel, as the emphasis changes to
covering the
turbulent and violent time period leading up to the Civil War. I will be
profiling local abolitionists, colonizationists, slave holders, slave catchers,
as well as the people, bound and free, caught between these constantly warring
groups.
wonder and pride
Writing the book has
been a wonderful voyage of discovery. I have always been fascinated by local
history, and thought I knew a lot about what
Harrisburg and the surrounding area
was like in colonial through antebellum times. I
soon realized, as I got deeper into my research, that I had vastly underestimated
the importance of the events in this region, not to mention the power of
local social and political alliances, on the national debate over slavery.
Mostly I was impressed by the individual stories I uncovered. The midstate
witnessed scenes of brutal violence, dramatic rescues, courageous legislation,
and
enraging
slave
hunts.
Its history
is
peppered
throughout
by acts of bravery, treachery, moral strength and desparate cowardice. The
principle actors in all of this were common people who found their own life
threads wound inextricably into the fabric of our national destiny. They
were laborers, farmers, soldiers, preachers, teachers, judges, seamstresses,
newspaper editors, sheriffs, widows and merchants. I love walking through
the streets of Harrisburg and imagining the likes of George Chester inviting
local abolitionists into his oyster house just off Market Street to read
the latest issue of The
Liberator, or William Bennett sending some of his young chimney sweeps
to the river, to watch for fugitive slaves who might be crossing over the
Camelback Bridge, and to intercept them and bring them quickly to his house
just behind Chestnut Street, before the local men who engaged in slave catching
caught sight of them. Sometimes I try to imagine the scene of panic and confusion
among local residents as local militiamen, in an attempt to quell the tumult
surrounding a slave rescue, rolled a cannon from the state arsenal into position
at Third and Walnut Streets,
and aimed
it
eastward
at the densly populated African American neighborhood of Tanners Alley. Events
such as these, equally dramatic, occurred in the streets of Lancaster,
Reading, Carlisle, York, and in the countless small towns that surround us.
Most of them are as unknown today as they were sensational in their time,
and taken as a whole, these are the events that, one by one, polarized the
public and sectionalized politicians. It was riots in Harrisburg, rebellion
in Christiana, strife along the Maryland-Pennsylvania border, threats, kidnappings
and murders throughout Central Pennsylvania, that led the country into Civil
War.
Is it any wonder,
then, that I am struck by a strong sense of awe when I ponder the historical
significance of our region, and feel a certain pride to be a resident of
the same area that was home to so many people who played critical roles,
both tragic and proud, in our national history? Too many people see only
the well marked fields of Gettysburg when they look to Central Pennsylvania
for a historical reference, as if that shrine to the turning point
in the war for African American liberation materialized by happenstance in
the Pennsylvania hinterland. History, however, is never so capricious as
to weave such a great event without the warp and woof of lesser events, the
threads of which lead directly back to the streets of Harrisburg, the fields
of Lancaster, and the rolling hills of York. That was my discovery, this
past year, and that is why I brought back the Afrolumens Project: to share
the inspiring story of how the people of the Harrisburg region struggled
to progress from slavery to freedom. |
