In 1945, Black leaders gained political and financial support from the governments of Virginia and the United States to establish the Booker T. Washington Birthplace Memorial at the site of Washington’s birth in Franklin County, Virginia. The Memorial organization undertook public history work that emphasized Washington as a significant figure in United States history and provided needed education services to Black Southerners. In pursuit of their goals staff, of the Memorial navigated the political and social context of Jim Crow Virginia; this thesis discusses how the history of Booker T. Washington was represented during the founding and operation of the Birthplace Memorial (1945-1956), a time of upheaval in Virginian race relations. / M.A. / Memorials are spaces of remembrance which signify the values of the society in which they are constructed. In 1945, a group of Black leaders established a memorial to Booker T. Washington at the site of his birth in Hardy, Virginia. The establishment of this memorial was a remarkable feat in the historical context of its creation. Memorial founders gained support from white elites in the Virginia and federal governments during the Jim Crow Era, a time of legal and social discrimination against African Americans. This thesis explores the work of the public historians at The Booker T. Washington Birthplace Memorial as they gained support for its establishment, developed programming to meet the needs of the local African American community, and represented the history of Booker T. Washington.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VTETD/oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/115287 |
| Date | 05 1900 |
| Creators | Evers, Sara L. |
| Contributors | History, Taylor, Jessica, Quigley, Paul, Hicks, David |
| Publisher | Virginia Tech |
| Source Sets | Virginia Tech Theses and Dissertation |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | ETD, application/pdf, application/pdf |
| Coverage | Virginia, United States, Franklin County |
| Rights | Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ |
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