I drove north to Ellicott City on June 11, 2017 feeling a little bit sheepish -- and maybe a tad embarrassed, too. I've been a student of the American Revolution most of my life. I fell in love with the subject in fifth grade and the passion is still with me as I push 50. Yet there I was, a resident of Maryland for 10 years but making only my first visit to the Benjamin Banneker Historical Park and Museum that sits in Catonsville. That's just a stone throw or two from Old Ellicott City, Maryland.
I knew that Banneker played a key role in mapping the newly formed District of Columbia but that was about all I knew -- at least as the day began. I pulled into the complex to attend the Colonial Market Fair 2017 and became spellbound the moment the mouth-watering scent of bread cooking in an 18th century earthen oven wafted over me. It smelled like heaven.
My stomach already grumbling, my brain developed hunger pains just as quickly. I entered the museum building and fought against a sudden onset of Attention Deficit Disorder, though I often refer to my own affliction as Attention Surplus Disorder. I like to concentrate on ten things at once. I heard fife and drums echoing from outside. Inside, I saw all kinds of displays I had to check out. I grimaced in pain as I examined a table full of antique surgical "instruments." I moved from exhibit to exhibit before entering the main room dedicated to Banneker. I had no idea that he was the first African-American giant of science, that he was an exceptional astronomer or that he published superb almanacs. I didn't know that he was a powerful advocate for the abolition of slavery.
I headed outside to throw myself into all the action taking place there, transporting myself back in time more than two centuries in the process. The fife and drum corps continued playing with military precision, giving way to a man playing a stringed instrument resembling a mandolin. Skilled tradesmen and women wove baskets, made soap, crafted fine leather bags and gunpowder horns, stitched cane chairs, and lovingly made dolls for children. Yet other people toiled away making corn brooms, cleaning laundry, and using wood to craft tools and other necessities. I perused displays of jewelry, fine lace and candles.
Bang! A soldier in the distance fired a musket and nearly sent me flying out of my shoes.
A town crier rang a bell and directed people to a wide array of entertainment. I turned to my girlfriend Won-ok and asked her to film a video clip of me introducing the fair in case we ended up shooting a segment or two for a YouTube channel I've long dreamed of launching -- a place to tell the stories of the fascinating faces and places we encounter all the time. (Watch the Colonial Market Fair opening video.) We shot the intro and continued our stroll through the 142-acre grounds. A man walked by who quite resembled the namesake of the historic site.
"Are you Benjamin Banneker?" I asked.
Indeed he was. I asked him if I could interview him, recognizing that we HAD to launch Faces and Places TV that very day. Banneker kindly granted this one-time scribe's request. Won-ok and I would go on to film a total of eight segments by day's end -- essentially a whole episode of a TV show. Watch all eight Colonial Market Fair 2017 videos here. Banneker told me about his early life, the arduous task of using astronomy to help map the new federal territory in the dead of winter and the importance of education.
"I didn't attend school for very long but I was able to read," said Banneker, whose 21st century name is Bob Smith, a professional actor and storyteller out of Baltimore. He remained in perfect character throughout our chat. "I had access to books. As long as you can read, you can learn to do anything." (Watch the Banneker video.)
I thanked Banneker for his time and walked away elated from the unexpected encounter, the chance not just to learn about history from the pages of a book but to literally shake hands with it. I was pumped and ready for more!
A song caught my attention, spilling out over the field -- from a voice deep in pain, one crying out to God above for the strength to survive. The voice belonged to songstress Brenda Tucker, who shared her gift of Negro Spirituals with all who would listen. She sat down with us afterward and conveyed why it's so important to her to sing those songs.
"You put yourself in the place of the person who created the music, those who sang it," she said, the brim of her hat occasionally giving way to her beautiful deep, dark eyes that conveyed as much pain and hope as her words. "They were out in the fields picking cotton and picking tobacco, working in the rice fields and working as domestics. They were out in the fields in the hot, burning sun and they had to keep going. So you put yourself back where your ancestors were." Tucker's words did exactly that, causing her to break out into a spontaneous song -- "Lord, How Come Me Here." Goosebumps sprouted on my arms and I had to fight back tears. You have to watch the video. You have to hear her sing. (Watch the Tucker interview.)
Emotionally spent, I turned to something a little easier on my soul. I chatted with book artist Martha Edgerton about book binding in the 18th and 19th centuries. I'm a rare book collector myself and collect the American Revolution. I always love seeing the old tools of the trade. Turned out that Edgerton also currently has an exhibition of her work on the subject of slavery on display at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum on Pratt Street in Baltimore. That will be next on my list of places to visit. (Watch the Martha Edgerton interview.)
Mysterious forces then pulled me to the display of "Edmund Howarth," a natural philosopher whose trade is "the collecting and trade of natural curiosities." I saw taxidermy squirrels, little alligator heads, animal bones and a seemingly infinite number of oddities tucked inside specimen jars. He quoted his hero, American scientist Charles Willson Peale, in telling me that "Nature is simply a book and we are meant to read it by turning its pages." Howarth (a science educator and living history instructor whose modern name is Dean Howarth) pays further homage by assembling his own library of natural wonders. (Watch the Dean Howarth video interview.)
I spotted a man in plain white garb approaching a tent to perform. Branch Morgan III is a retired school teacher with a passion for sharing his love of historic African and African-American rituals and the origin of dance. He brought the whole crowd up to join him in "The Ring Shout," a ritual practiced by slaves who moved around in circles shuffling their feet and clapping their hands. They did not cross their feet, Morgan stressed. That would be dancing, and that was the devil's work. Morgan told me that slaves often had to wander deep into the woods to perform "The Ring Shout," lest slave masters see them and think they weren't working the slaves hard enough. The thought left me speechless. (Watch the Branch Morgan III interview.)
The day drawing to a close, I made my way back inside the museum for a pit stop between the 18th and 21st centuries. I met Justine Schaeffer, the director of the Benjamin Banneker Historical Park and Museum. The fair marked her last day at the post with the Baltimore County site. I didn't know until that moment that the place was run by the county. I tipped my tricorn hat to her and the county for a job exceptionally well done. I asked her what she'll take away most from her tenure at the historical park.
"I think it's an appreciation of the accomplishments of a free African-American man and what that means to us today," she told me, with a life-sized Banneker figure listening in. "He was a man who overcame obstacles throughout his life at a time when most people with his skin color were enslaved. There are messages in his life for each of us. There are things for older people, that we can accomplish things in later decades ... for younger people, who can overcome those obstacles to achieve [their] goals ... his message as a human being, those universals that drive us all. It has been an honor for me to be here, to learn about him and to teach others about him." (Watch the Justine Schaeffer interview.)
Her words hung in the air as I exited the museum and made my way out of the Colonial Market Fair 2017. I wasn't quite sure what I was going to say on-camera, how I was going to sum up the profoundly moving day that I had just spent with Benjamin Banneker and colonial America. The impact of it was moving through me like the slow, undulating spiritual I heard Tucker sing. I asked Won-ok to just hit record on her phone and that I would say whatever came from my heart. (Watch the closing thoughts video.)
Lyrics from another Negro Spiritual I heard earlier came to me -- "Lord I've Been Changed." I used that thought in my closing and called it a wrap. Even after Won-ok and I returned home and spent all night producing the videos, though, I knew two things for certain: I'll absolutely return to the Benjamin Banneker Historical Park and Museum on a more regular basis -- and that doing so will continue to change me in ways I can't yet fully imagine.
Christopher Lancette is a former journalist and avid history buff with a particular passion for all things American Revolution. He would be honored if you helped spread this post far and wide so that more people may learn about the life and times of Benjamin Banneker and appreciate all those who give their time and talent to educating people about history.
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