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Visiting Annapolis a few weeks ago, I had a chance to see the nearly completed installation of Freedom Bound: Runaways of the Chesapeake, a year-long exhibit about the resistance to servitude and slavery in the Chesapeake Bay region from the colonial period to the Civil War.  Heather Ersts and Ariane Hofstedt of the Historic Annapolis Foundation graciously provided a personal tour of the exhibit, which is installed in several museums and historic sites around the city.  It’s an exhibit worth seeing not only for the content, but also the design, and several items jumped out at me:

1.  The exhibit looks at the varied experiences of people through nine persons.  Seven of these persons were enslaved Africans, but two are white–a convict servant and an indentured servant–which will surprise most visitors.  It complicates the usual narrative that only Africans were held in bondage (of course, being owned as a slave is very different from being incarcerated as a convict) and it’s by encountering the unexpected that people are more likely to learn.  The typical exhibit about slavery trots out the same 1850 drawing of the slave ship Brooks, a pair of iron shackles, and perhaps a tag from Charleston.  Yes, those are all authentic and true, but the constant repeat of these items renders them powerless and keeps the visitor at a superficial level.  In Freedom Bound, those items are there but have been pushed to the periphery.  Instead the focus is on the person, who appear as individual lifesize mannequins dressed in the clothing described in the fugitive’s runaway ad.  It may be speculative and reproduction, but it places a person at the center of the story, not their legal condition or social status.

2.  The exhibit focuses on freedom.  This is a welcome departure from the usual story about slavery and the unspoken assumption that slaves didn’t have the ambition or intelligence to leave the plantation, or that masters were so kind and life so good, that it wasn’t worth leaving.  This exhibit departs from that story by highlighting nine people who  left their masters despite the great personal risks.  That’s explored in “Pack Your Bags,” a hands-on exercise where visitors have to choose what to bring and leave behind from among clothes, food, equipment, and even children.

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3.  The exhibit is based upon and inspired by original research.  The Historic Annapolis Foundation launched Project Run-A-Way a couple years ago to develop a database of runaway ads from the Maryland Gazette.   With the help of volunteers, more than 3,300 runaway notices describing almost 1,000 individuals in 22 years of the Gazette have been identified.  Most runaway ads are filled with details about the fugitives’ physical characteristics, clothing, work skills, mannerisms, personal relationships, geographic knowledge, etc.—anything that would help identify the escaped individuals so they could be found.  Most fascinating is the story of Nace Butler, who sued for freedom based upon the status of his 17th century ancestor Eleanor Butler, whose lineage was established by oral history.  Butler’s family tree is now rendered in a stunning graphic that fills a wall.  All of this research inspired a series of theatrical performances last year, and this year launched the Freedom Bound exhibit.

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4.  The exhibit is thoughtfully organized and beautifully presented.  The exhibit distills an amazing amount of information in the usual scheme of layered labels, carefully chosen images, videos, and flipbooks, but a clever addition is a blue box with a summary point, such as, “People will risk their lives to end systems of oppression that deny freedom to them and their families.”  The exhibit is designed to travel and be installed in buildings without climate control or supervision, so materials were selected to be durable, low maintenance, and finished on all sides.  It’s a result of several consultants and designers, including Adler Display, Drew Campbell Graphic Design, Art at Large, Lucidity Informaton Design, Ieva Ersts, Dean Krimmel, LSP Studios, and Charles Mack Design.

This exhibit is extremely ambitious for a local history organization.  The small staff not only have to synthesize the research but also coordinate the consultants and assemble the funding while still maintaining their existing workload.  This type of effort is rare, so it’s impressive when it occurs and it should have a longterm impact on its engagement with its visitors.  Congratulations to the Historic Annapolis Foundation on an excellent exhibit.