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February 11, 2007
A Fortunate Series of Coincidences?
Brooklyn Downtown Star finds a link between Barclays, Duffield Street, and Black History Month:
Joy Chatel has begun the process of formally converting some - and eventually perhaps all - of her home into a museum of African-American and American Abolitionist history. Abolitionists used to live there, and fugitive slaves may have hid out in her very basement.And earlier this week, some of the earliest visitors to her new museum were from - guess where? - Britain, and they are researching the very trans-Atlantic slave trade that was already in the headlines because of old British money coming to Brooklyn.
These two news events did not cause each other - their simultaneous prominence is a coincidence. But we should take this coincidence as a blessing, both to increase our historical knowledge and to use it to reflect on the present. The very first thing we should realize is that the antebellum Duffield Street rowhouses should not be torn down - and especially not for a parking lot.
Posted by amy at February 11, 2007 1:09 PM