Mixed feelings here. I have been through so many of these places; in reality, they run the gamut from whitewashing slavery (and post-slavery indentured servanthood) to making slavery itself front and center.
Do not discount the ability of plantation houses to educate, inform, and make real what many people have only seen on tv or in movies. It’s one thing to watch North and South or Roots and think you know something, and quite another to stand in the slave cabins of an actual plantation, knowing that your ancestors were there or but for an accident of birth, they were not.
Personally, I think EVERY American should have to go to a real plantation that has recreated or restored slave quarters and a living illustration of slave life, and see for themselves what it’s like to live twelve to a tiny cabin, or think about being the author/inventor of ingenious machinery and systems worth millions in today’s cash only to see yourself excised from your own work and watch your master’s name be placed on it, or even just to see with your own eyes the overwhelming difference in living conditions: the wattle and daub on the slave huts a few hundred yards away from the hand painted murals imported jacquard silks adorning the walls of the big house.
Why? So many people today are convinced they’d never be a slave that they can’t even spot the current movement of the entire country back to that system. These Trump stans have NO idea that beyond the religion, beyond the demolition of women’s rights and the embrace of constant fear, the entire point is to recreate a ruling class while the rest of us work for company scrip down the company store.
So I say let 'em visit some plantations and see for themselves what an accident of birth plus an authoritarian system can do to your life. America may well have been free for white men in the slavery years, but it sure as hell wasn’t for anyone of color, nor for most women. Maybe some of them will get a clue.
Thus I think it’s just as dishonest to history to discard these places as it is to embrace them unquestioningly. Instead, go – and if they’re not already, demand they show the truth about what really happened there. It’s the reason Auschwitz is still open and maintained as a museum, and frankly I think that should be required visiting as well. But if it’s not up to par, you can be the change you want to see.
What I mean is that if you ever find yourself in one and they’re whitewashing the history (and it’s history you know yourself) you can absolutely make your own tour include those tidbits. Study before you go so you can know to ask where the “servants” lived, and then ask if they were really slaves. Ask who taught the young daughter her music, and how much more that skilled slave cost in relation to the unskilled slaves. Ask when slaves were manumitted, and by whom, and why. Etcetera.
I’m not saying torture the tour guide, lol. But you can very honestly ask these questions, sprinkled into the conversation very politely and with respect for others in the tour, and add, “I wish you’d include this in your presentation, because it’s an important part of history.” Then write the house owner, leave feedback: it’s one of the few places left where if you say you want them to do this, they very likely will, because they live and die on every penny of your tourism money. Especially now, post-pandemic.
Or you can just skip those altogether and go to the ones that really are trying to do right by the history. The Whitney is one, down in Edgard, LA, and there are others in that area that are doing the same, like Laura. If you’re looking for places to go, know that a very good sign is whether they have bothered to recreate or restore the slave quarters, and/or are supporting studies and archaeological digs at the slave quarter sites, like Boone Hall in Charleston. They can’t change what their ancestors did, but they can sure as hell do right by what remains, and some are doing an excellent job. So don’t count those out.
But know in advance that because slave quarters were almost always made of the shittiest materials with the least amount of labor dedicated to them, and absolutely were NOT maintained post-Emancipation, houses like the Whitney are quite rare. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Whitney is the only complete house left, though I don’t know for a fact whether that’s the case.
Personally, I prefer not to visit any place that is still owned by the original family; I still have a truly bad taste in my mouth from Biltmore and the Vanderbilt-Cecil family that owns it, because the last time I went (20+ years ago now) visitors were subjected to this truly shitty, self-exonerating 20 minute video that did nothing but talk about how very, very well ALL the “servants” of the estate were treated at all times in every minute and what valued fucking “members of the family” they were and how very privileged the family up at the big house was to have such fine people on the estate to care for it, etc. I don’t think the word “slave” was ever used, it was “friends” and “valued partners” and “our Biltmore family” and shit like that. Jesus fucking christ it was bad. I can take ipecac if I ever need to puke, didn’t need that. Even if they don’t play it anymore, I’ll still never go back.
But now you know. They’re all different, and they can ALL be used to make better, more thoughtful and knowledgeable people of their visitors, if they are made to be.
I read your whole post and then started laughing at your video description.
It sounds like an HR video new hires are required to watch where some over the top 50 year old woman who failed her realtor examine welcomes you to your new work family.
Thank you for the suggestions of the tours. The white washing is despicable, and it will only get worse unless people call it out.
It sounds like an HR video new hires are required to watch where some over the top 50 year old woman who failed her realtor examine welcomes you to your new work family.
Lol, yes. In a nutshell. That description is actually very close to the mark. If I recall correctly it was a female member of the Cecil family of about that mature age who was smiling so forcefully and so desperate to seem nice that I wondered if she was doing it at gunpoint. It was excruciatingly obvious that someone had given them the DEI speech and said “you have to do this if you want to shut down criticism of your past labor practices.” So they did. It didn’t work.
In truth, the Vanderbilt-Cecils were no better than any other Golden Age employers, and given some of the credible history, among the worst. I think they would give anything to go back to those days and force the rest of us to go back with them to serve them – but now they can’t afford to keep up the big houses without us plebes paying admission, so they have to act suddenly egalitarian if they want to continue to live there. I hope she choked on it, lol.
EDITED TO ADD: They have the same kind of shit on the Wikipedia page for George Washington Vanderbilt II, how nice he was to all the little estate children and gave them presents even if they couldn’t make it to the Christmas party. Jesus. I don’t want to shit on one man’s kindness, if in fact all that is true, but that’s what that entire video was made of. A look at the talk page reveals the involvement of the Biltmore Estate in the maintenance of the Wiki page.
I agree required visiting would be a great thing. I’m not sure if it’s required but it’s at least extremely common in germany to visit the nearest KZ at some point, and I think that in particular drives home the horrors quite well (even if the response to the palestinian genocide and the popularity of the AfD shows that it’s clearly not working perfectly, but I guess that’s impossible).
Mixed feelings here. I have been through so many of these places; in reality, they run the gamut from whitewashing slavery (and post-slavery indentured servanthood) to making slavery itself front and center.
Do not discount the ability of plantation houses to educate, inform, and make real what many people have only seen on tv or in movies. It’s one thing to watch North and South or Roots and think you know something, and quite another to stand in the slave cabins of an actual plantation, knowing that your ancestors were there or but for an accident of birth, they were not.
Personally, I think EVERY American should have to go to a real plantation that has recreated or restored slave quarters and a living illustration of slave life, and see for themselves what it’s like to live twelve to a tiny cabin, or think about being the author/inventor of ingenious machinery and systems worth millions in today’s cash only to see yourself excised from your own work and watch your master’s name be placed on it, or even just to see with your own eyes the overwhelming difference in living conditions: the wattle and daub on the slave huts a few hundred yards away from the hand painted murals imported jacquard silks adorning the walls of the big house.
Why? So many people today are convinced they’d never be a slave that they can’t even spot the current movement of the entire country back to that system. These Trump stans have NO idea that beyond the religion, beyond the demolition of women’s rights and the embrace of constant fear, the entire point is to recreate a ruling class while the rest of us work for company scrip down the company store.
So I say let 'em visit some plantations and see for themselves what an accident of birth plus an authoritarian system can do to your life. America may well have been free for white men in the slavery years, but it sure as hell wasn’t for anyone of color, nor for most women. Maybe some of them will get a clue.
Thus I think it’s just as dishonest to history to discard these places as it is to embrace them unquestioningly. Instead, go – and if they’re not already, demand they show the truth about what really happened there. It’s the reason Auschwitz is still open and maintained as a museum, and frankly I think that should be required visiting as well. But if it’s not up to par, you can be the change you want to see.
What I mean is that if you ever find yourself in one and they’re whitewashing the history (and it’s history you know yourself) you can absolutely make your own tour include those tidbits. Study before you go so you can know to ask where the “servants” lived, and then ask if they were really slaves. Ask who taught the young daughter her music, and how much more that skilled slave cost in relation to the unskilled slaves. Ask when slaves were manumitted, and by whom, and why. Etcetera.
I’m not saying torture the tour guide, lol. But you can very honestly ask these questions, sprinkled into the conversation very politely and with respect for others in the tour, and add, “I wish you’d include this in your presentation, because it’s an important part of history.” Then write the house owner, leave feedback: it’s one of the few places left where if you say you want them to do this, they very likely will, because they live and die on every penny of your tourism money. Especially now, post-pandemic.
Or you can just skip those altogether and go to the ones that really are trying to do right by the history. The Whitney is one, down in Edgard, LA, and there are others in that area that are doing the same, like Laura. If you’re looking for places to go, know that a very good sign is whether they have bothered to recreate or restore the slave quarters, and/or are supporting studies and archaeological digs at the slave quarter sites, like Boone Hall in Charleston. They can’t change what their ancestors did, but they can sure as hell do right by what remains, and some are doing an excellent job. So don’t count those out.
But know in advance that because slave quarters were almost always made of the shittiest materials with the least amount of labor dedicated to them, and absolutely were NOT maintained post-Emancipation, houses like the Whitney are quite rare. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Whitney is the only complete house left, though I don’t know for a fact whether that’s the case.
Personally, I prefer not to visit any place that is still owned by the original family; I still have a truly bad taste in my mouth from Biltmore and the Vanderbilt-Cecil family that owns it, because the last time I went (20+ years ago now) visitors were subjected to this truly shitty, self-exonerating 20 minute video that did nothing but talk about how very, very well ALL the “servants” of the estate were treated at all times in every minute and what valued fucking “members of the family” they were and how very privileged the family up at the big house was to have such fine people on the estate to care for it, etc. I don’t think the word “slave” was ever used, it was “friends” and “valued partners” and “our Biltmore family” and shit like that. Jesus fucking christ it was bad. I can take ipecac if I ever need to puke, didn’t need that. Even if they don’t play it anymore, I’ll still never go back.
But now you know. They’re all different, and they can ALL be used to make better, more thoughtful and knowledgeable people of their visitors, if they are made to be.
I read your whole post and then started laughing at your video description.
It sounds like an HR video new hires are required to watch where some over the top 50 year old woman who failed her realtor examine welcomes you to your new work family.
Thank you for the suggestions of the tours. The white washing is despicable, and it will only get worse unless people call it out.
Lol, yes. In a nutshell. That description is actually very close to the mark. If I recall correctly it was a female member of the Cecil family of about that mature age who was smiling so forcefully and so desperate to seem nice that I wondered if she was doing it at gunpoint. It was excruciatingly obvious that someone had given them the DEI speech and said “you have to do this if you want to shut down criticism of your past labor practices.” So they did. It didn’t work.
In truth, the Vanderbilt-Cecils were no better than any other Golden Age employers, and given some of the credible history, among the worst. I think they would give anything to go back to those days and force the rest of us to go back with them to serve them – but now they can’t afford to keep up the big houses without us plebes paying admission, so they have to act suddenly egalitarian if they want to continue to live there. I hope she choked on it, lol.
EDITED TO ADD: They have the same kind of shit on the Wikipedia page for George Washington Vanderbilt II, how nice he was to all the little estate children and gave them presents even if they couldn’t make it to the Christmas party. Jesus. I don’t want to shit on one man’s kindness, if in fact all that is true, but that’s what that entire video was made of. A look at the talk page reveals the involvement of the Biltmore Estate in the maintenance of the Wiki page.
I agree required visiting would be a great thing. I’m not sure if it’s required but it’s at least extremely common in germany to visit the nearest KZ at some point, and I think that in particular drives home the horrors quite well (even if the response to the palestinian genocide and the popularity of the AfD shows that it’s clearly not working perfectly, but I guess that’s impossible).