Black History Month

[L Verge]

I failed to mention that Surratt House had a fantastic program this past Saturday in commemoration of Black History Month. Some of you may be aware of the controversy over the past few years about the Catholic Church owning plantations and slaves up until the Civil War. It was especially strong in Maryland where the colony was conceived as a Catholic colony and where there was a heavy influence of Jesuits (such as the Mudd clan) from the earliest days. Georgetown University has been heavily involved in this modern controversy because of the Jesuits using slave economy to support the institution.

We invited an outstanding professor, Adam Rothman, to speak on the issue, and we had an SRO audience of over 100 (in a room coded for 75) and turned away about another 10 because of space issues. Dr. Rothman's training from year one has been in black history (although he's white and 40ish), and he holds degrees from Harvard and Columbia. He literally held the audience in the palm of his hand, used no notes, stuck to the facts, and offered no apologies nor excuses for the Church's position of long ago.

The audience was very diverse - black, white, Latino, and even one family from Middle Eastern roots. Quite a few civilian theologians in the audience who knew their history and one lady from Colombia, South America, who reminded us that slavery was not just an American issue and gave some thoughts on the issue in her country. The program lasted for nearly two hours with so any questions - and no one left except to use the facilities. Neither was there any hostility on the issue of slavery or on the Catholic Church.

Rothman is also the author of an interesting book on Beyond Freedom's Reach, a true case of slave kidnapping that ended up in a court case after the Civil War. He works with Georgetown's acclaimed Slave Archives as well as many other related projects. This was truly one of those programs that museum directors dream about.