National Council on Public History

Sade Turnipseed, Executive Director / History Professor, Khafre, Inc / MVSU

Proposal Type

Panel

Seeking

• Seeking Additional Presenters
• General Feedback and Interest

Related Topics

• Material Culture
• Place
• Memory

Abstract

By studying the cotton plantation system of the Old South and operations owned by Joseph and Jefferson Davis, juxtaposed t o the self-determined agency of Benjamin Montgomery, and how Davis Bend became what was considered an “imagined community” in the historical township of Mound Bayou. This panel will shine a spotlight on the essential ideal of cooperation to form America’s first all-African American township, i.e., Mound Bayou, MS.

Seeking

I am looking for a counter-narrative to the Davis Bend position of a “cooperative community” in the antebellum south.

The irony and the idiocy of racism are revealed when the economic and social construct of the Davis Bend Plantation dependency laid firmly on the technical knowledge and honesty of men like Benjamin Montgomery who lived, work ed and died on plantations of the American South. The Davis Bend Plantation , by default, was the central ideological and financial nucleus of Jefferson Davis’ ability to administrate a secessionist movement; again ironically, which was managed by African people commonly believed to be too unintelligent, unsophisticated, unskilled and childlike to manage their own lives, but who in fact and in deed managed the economic and personal stronghold of the President of the Confederacy. Benjamin Montgomery’s skills of negotiation and compromise were parlayed to his community, providing them with the ideological framework and discipline to successfully negotiate land deals with a major railroad company thereby officially establishing themselves as the first American township of and by formerly enslaved people, at a time when it was illegal to sell land and property to Africans in America.

The drive, determination, and discipline embraced by the extended community of Davis Bend still encompasses the town of Mound Bayou enabling them the fortitude and wherewithal to host a national memorial in honor of people who planted, picked and spun cotton, i.e., Cotton Pickers. This again not only speaks to the material culture that still exists in both Davis Bend and Mound Bayou, and must be preserved, but also to the power of voice and narrative in America’s public interpretive spaces.

If you have a direct offer of assistance, sensitive criticism, or wish to share contact information for other people the proposer should reach out to, please get in contact directly: C. Sade Turnipseed

If you have general ideas or feedback to share please feel free to use the comments feature below.

All feedback, and offers of assistance, should be submitted by July 3, 2016.

COMMENTS HAVE CLOSED. PLEASE EMAIL THE PROPOSER DIRECTLY WITH ANY ADDITIONAL COMMENTS OR OFFERS TO COLLABORATE.

Discussion