Transcripts For CSPAN2 African 20240704 : comparemela.com

On cspan2 exploring the people and events that tell the american story. At 3 p. M. Eastern watched the second part of the Calvin Coolidge centennial Conference Marking this into knew of the 30th president s essential to the white house. At 9 30 p. M. Eastern on the presidency peterson is a former white house photographer for president S Ronald Reagan and barack obama talks about the daytoday working as of the presence including history making moments he witnessed exploring the american story come watch American History tv saturdays on csn2nd friday full schedule underroam guide or watch online anytime at cspan. Org history. Will hello, everybody and welcome to our Virtual Program tonight. Myna name is morgan byrn, and te Public Programs manager at the Tennessee State museum and we are thrilled to have Antoine Fletcher from theat Great Smoky Mountains National Park with us here tonight. And before we can start a couple of things. Please remember to mute yourself. Our program tonight will be recorded so you will be able to find that online within the next couplele of days also at the end program tonight will have time for questions. So if you have a question, please send that in the chat and joyska will be asking this at the end of the program so again thank you, guys are joining us tonight, and help me in welcoming Ranger Fletcher to our program. Thank you very much and thank you, everyone tonight for joining again, my name is ranger Antoine Fletcher. Kind the science communicator for Great Smoky Mountains National Park in the appalachian highland Science Learning center. Tonight, welcome on behalf of the National Park service i did want to welcome you all to your africanamerican experiences in the smokies. This projectrk is so important that we have been working on it for so long that we are finally getting to the point where we really just getting information out to the masses and educating people on that so tonight were goingg to learn about several different storiesct than several different africanamericans that really impacts not only the smokies but the appalachian region. A little about myself before i get started. I have been a park ranger for about 16 years, and ive worked in a lot of different perks including the smokies, lyndon b. Johnson, Waco Mammoth National monument, fort sumter and russell cave bear and so ive had quite the experience in the National Park service. So as we said earlier, any kind of questions that you have at the end of this ill make sure we get to them, so lets get started. So Great Smoky Mountains National Park its such beautiful park and was that is that was in 1934. We have about 800 square miles of park in east tennessee and Western North carolina. And as you know, were known for our beauty biodiversity but also were known for our human vestiges. We have about 9000 years of human between early white settlers native americans and africanamericans. And again if youve never been the Great Smoky Mountains park, you have to see it. You may have to see me there. But lets move on to main story. I cant let you all to look at this screen and just think about the history, as i just talked about human vestiges and date about when you come to the smokies what history may what what will you think about what comes to mind when youre driving this scenic view theyre looking over the overlook on the left here youll. See the civilian conservation Corps Members, its probably circa 1930s here. The civilian conservation corps really helped, you know, this park established and they maintained trails and cemeteries and built things and everything goes on. Youre right. You see the job cuts of 18 Corps Members in it circa 1960s and they did the same job it just as the csis. When you look at these, the reason ive put this up here is a lot of times when people come to the smokies, they only about, you know, the history such as the civilian conservation corps, but usually theyll think about africanamericans in the smokies or working in the smoky eyes. And that is something that were trying to change. And even with these two pictures you can see from 1930 and 1960s and 30 short years, park did start to change and now were just pushing it forward. But to let everyone know, you know, early white settler history, africanAmerican History, American History makes this park whole. And what were here to do tonight is till the entire picture of the smokies so how do we start this project . Well this project really dates prior to 18. Theres always, you know, friends of the smokies is Great Smoky Mountains association, our agency, our park our park rangers looking. How can we tell more stories about africa and americans in the region. And so in 2018, we really put that that effort forward. We really started looking the lives of African Americans. And just to kind of give a 30,000 foot view, we back up to the 1540 all the way to the present and what were doing is were looking at those artifacts, policies oral histories, photos that really helps us convey the story. You, the public, and were going do a little bit of that of that tonight. But we have to back up. We have to back. We up to, you know, how enslaved africans got to the region. And when people think slavery, they think about, you know, slavery in these such as charleston, south carolina, the lowcountry, they think, you know, slavery in memphis or just any kind of major ports such as new orleans. However, in slave africans actually made the journey further west or guinea a small on the african coast, all the way here as far as back as 1540. And so we that hernando de soto and his tribe bought enslaved africans over here in 1542. We know that, you know, captured africans were transported from guinea to the carolina colony in the 1600s as well. And so we date when they came and also they came from and you have to about the journey here just put yourself the minds of those enslaved africans to be taken from their home and sent to a place theyve never been to. The smokies, a region thats cooler or colder than what they theyre probably used mountain this you know a more walking and and things as that nature and it was a treacherous time to here however we have to tell the whole story and from that we know dead in appalachia we have to think about what those plantations looked like when they got here. The plant, the mountain is terrain really change what plantations looked like a lot of people think about the big white homes with several hundred you know, enslaved people and things such as that nature that you would see charleston but not so much because the mountainous terrain what you had here were these smaller plantations with about you 5 to 12 enslaved people. This is because, again was hard to transport enslaved people to the mountains. And also there would have been more into the enslaver would have been more into livestock, pigs, cattle, things such as that nature growing apples and we know that in the winter months when they couldnt, you know, necessarily feed all the enslaved, then they would rent those enslaved people out to places like asheville, North Carolina and tennessee, two hotels, as we know that people wouldve been mining crews, anything that you can think of at the time. So how do we investigate this history in the mountains to think about the smokies that a lot of people dont understand is the smoke is is very the smokies its out there if youve never been in a think about the Mountain Culture is that you know in the smokies people didnt really write stuff down there people that was illiterate that you know certain spell can write things like that and so you have a void at times telling the stories especially when it comes to enslave africans, africanamericans as term because. You know a lot of their stories were by the enslaver and so what we started to do is to investigate the history through primary documents and what youre looking here on your left is a slave schedule from 1850s. So back in this time in 1840, you had the census records. And so, you know, you can look do census and you, you know, you know, when people died or, you know, how old were. But in the 1850s enslavers wanted to keep with their property or their chattel and so they made these documents known the slave schedules that you could actually see today or ancestry dot com this is a slave schedule from Haywood County and it what were using is because were able to see how many slaves per county there was at the time and so a lot of towns people may say well you know there was slavery in the mountains things such as that nature which is not true. We know that some of the larger counties such as haywood which is where asheville, North Carolina, is not county were not real. Tennessee is average. They can have easily 1200 enslaved people. Indians so places such as coquille in the severe county jackson may only have 80 enslaved people in that county. Now, the thing to remember, too is they were just enslaved people in the mountains. They were free people color as well in the mountains thats been documented in places like. Cold or severe. Severe. So lets move on to our next slide. We talked about bringing visibility to the invisible. You know, if you think, you know, an enslavers not going to write a lot of information about the enslaved. Did not going to write birthdays and you know moments that they had their children and a lot of enslaved people you know that was born in slavery or brought over you know, they didnt know their birthday, their last names changed to the last name of the enslaved evers. So theres a lot of things, you know, are not, you know correct or on point but still are able to use documents and the reason of showing you all this document is because the civil really brings visibility to enslaved people. The slave schedules may tell the name, the first name of enslaved, you know, maybe not again, last name of the enslaver, the hair color, the occupation of farmer, Something Like that. But because of the civil war, you had on the left these mustard in roles where African Americans are actually enrolling and telling a little bit more about themselves. We know that a lot of africanamericans in the region, in rhode, in places like tennessee. And now if you look on your left here, you were able to see the age youre able to see they mustered in and things like that. And so youre able to see a little bit more. But also the deaths every kids as well. On your right youll see epic case for a headstone so. Now we also see this henry pride when he died, we can see a little bit where hes going to be buried and Everything Else in dance of further add to that information if were able to find it. We can see these pension records where enslaved or sorry not enslaved but civil war soldiers had to go in front of a judge and until you know where they lived if they had children the name of the children, their wives name all these things in order to get their pensions is so this is how we build the story how another thing that were doing is we use a technology to find in smokies something thats really important or really important artifact is the 150 some cemeteries that we have registered in some of those cemeteries. They are africanamerican kids freed and both enslaved. Bury we have several cemeteries in North Carolina as castellucci or the oak or a oh acre cemetery. And we also have cemeteries and higdon makes a mountain. Cemeteries can tell us lot if you look to your right here whats what we can do is be able to kind of build a little bit more of a picture with some of the primary documents we have. So on your right, going to see a little snippet of one of the historians from the 1940s that he wrote about a graveyard and hes about the catalyst year, the mohican cemetery is so you know how many people we think is there and so on. But if you look under that, youll be able to see that what we ran into, we ran into things such as, okay, were looking at these slaves schedules and the enslaver. The name may be a au coeur, however, its really o e ker and you see those changes in those records because. The numerator would write down what they heard when theyre taking the census of enslaved. So if they take name as o e or if they take the enslavers name as a o or whatever that may be, what happens is thats what gets written and thats what gets written down in history. So we have to make sure that were correct on their but if we if we go a little we could talk about were using this technology. So what were doing is were working western Carolina University and what bringing in men to do Ground Penetrating and the great thing about this not only are we partnering well one of our fellow universities, we also bring in asheville city, greenwood, which is the program that brings teenagers out to get. Its in a National Park service. So as to internship in these students and this university actually go out and they do a Ground Penetrating radar survey and what Ground Penetrating radar does is it bounces waves off of whatever is underground and, you know, two, four, six feet according on where it is it bounces back. Is this image which you will see on the right, which are explained in just a second, and then were able to do a less intrusive or invasive way of figuring. Now, if the are right in the primary documents in the land deeds, what youre looking at here on the left is the inflow slaves. Abraham, jim enloe, the minguss, which well about in the second in the hides all old slaves in the account left the area which is on the North Carolina side of the park, the gateway of cherokee and what youre looking there is gravesite. Now lets talk a little bit about the territory digs for what youre seeing at a grave site in the smokies period. A lot of times people may think the enslaved people in early white were very differently and in some cases in some some things they were as far as the area where they were buried in some of in some of the techniques they were definitely the same. And so if come in the smokies you see open areas as you see on the left what is clear and how you know greenery where you know other enslaved people or early white settlers buried and the reason they did that in the mountains is made clear out their area in the mountains is because theres a lot of critters, the smokies, a lot of snakes, things like that. So they want to make sure that no one would be bitten by a snake or anything like that. And then Something Else youre probably going to notice or head and foot stones. So if you look closely at the photo, youll see hidden foot stones left and right of the Ground Penetrating radar or even the hills. Those stones were made out as soapstone and anything that was in area at the time, sandstone you didnt see granite as, but thats what they had someone have worked those stones with some kind of hammer and they would have made the deepest that we see today Something Else you would know this in the graveyard words are people are oriented from east to west as you know enslaved people were really in into you know it comes to baptists or the religion that was in the area. So a lot of these grave sites are east, east to west for the sake and coming of christ so thats how they buried people. Now if you look even closer you may see a couple of hills and troughs there in 18, 1800s. Some of this was normal in the smokies is pretty wet. We get a lot of rain and so what you have these graves would move families would come back and they will put back over these graves as they moved. So you see that quite a bit. What did you see. What enslaved cemeteries or the inscriptions in things that you would see in the early white settlers cemeteries. So you look closely at the headstone, what you what you wont see is, you know, this person was loved there something that something telling us a little bit about the person their favorite and this really shows you the people that were able to those stones were a little bit Higher Society in the smokies and out of all the enslaved cemeteries are that have enslaved burials in them. We have not found any inscriptions of any kind. And so it really shows you just the culture in just where they were in the chain you know both socially economics and just socially in the smokies. So not able to read anything about these people. What we are able to do if look to the right, youre going to see a photo in blue and also youre going see a little bit of green yellow is kind of in the area. When i took over the project in 2018, we knew that there were African American burials here. We knew thought that there were maybe five enslaved people buried here. However, we discovered because Ground Penetrating radar that theres actually eight or more enslaved people buried right in this area. If you look at the numbers, those numbers show you the actual of the enslaved are not the or the hills that see on the left because these burials have moved over time in the other thing that weve discovered do Ground Pe