African Burial Ground, Lower Manhattan

Ranger Doug at the African Burial Ground Monument in Lower Manhattan

This summer, play tourist in your own city. 

And if you are one of those native New Yorkers that scoff at tourist traps like the Empire State Building or the Statue of Liberty, there is a relatively new attraction just north of City Hall that after one visit will change the way you will think about the American history you learned back in your school days. As we approach Juneteenth, a little known holiday that celebrates the emancipation of the last slaves of our nation, it’s worth a visit.

This spring on a visit back to New York City, my family went to the African Burial Ground National Monument and we all got a brush-up course on American history.

From what I remember about my public grade school education, slavery was taught like this: 

• Africans were captured from their native lands. 
• There was a very harsh, inhumane passage over the Atlantic where slaves chained together in the hulls of ships. 
• Southerners owned slaves to work in the cotton fields and in their master’s homes.
• Northerners didn’t own slaves.
• Blacks were treated as slaves in the South so they tried to escape to the North, to places like New York City where they could be free

My kids were disappointed that the indoor museum was closed that day. However, the outdoor African Burial Ground National Monument Memorial was open, as it is daily from 9a.m. until 5p.m. except for all Federal holidays. 

The burial site, used by African slaves from 1626 through the late 1700’s, was discovered only 21 years ago, when the federal government broke ground for a new building on 290 Broadway. Because archeologists uncovered the remains of 419 individual bodies of all age groups, it is regarded as one of the most important archeological findings of the 20th Century. In all, it was the final resting place for 15,000 Africans and their descendants It was the only place where Africans could be buried in the city.

The plans for the building were modified to accommodate a museum and a 6.1 acre monument that was opened to the public in 2007.

On the first approach to the memorial from Broadway, a grassy patch of ground with partially raised holds the remains of those 419 slaves. The grassy area gives way to a path marked by bricks and marble that spirals downward to what used to be the street level of the New York – or New Amsterdam – centuries ago.

The Circle of the Diaspora includes symbols that represent the African cultures from where the slaves were taken

The walls were marked by strange symbols and dates.

In the middle of this spiral is a map of the world that marks each native land where slaves were taken.

My kids, aged 14, 12 and seven, wandered around the site exploring.  Finally, my youngest mustered up the courage to ask the Ranger what this place was all about.

All it took was that one simple question.  Ranger Doug – Doug Maslenberg  — brought the history of this place to life. In a narrative presentation that was no less fervent  than sermon delivered like gospel at a Baptist church,  Ranger Doug went into great detail to tell us about the lives of the slaves who were found buried at this very site. Through his booming voice, he brought the suffering of those people back. He spoke of the horrors of the middle passage on those ships, represented at the memorial by the 24-foot Ancestral Libation chamber:

Reminiscent of a ship's hold, the interior is a place for individual reflection.

He spoke of the bones of children that had been bent under the weight of carrying bricks and buckets of water too heavy for their bodies to withstand. Bones of men that contained evidence of whippings.

Ranger Doug looked directly into our eyes, almost a bit too long. Any preconceived notion that I had about a slave-free New York City was obliterated under Ranger Doug’s stare.

Back at home in Rochester – a city with its own past link to Abolition and Emancipation – my kids and I wanted to learn more. So we picked up a historical novel called Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson. This young adult novel, a 2008 National Book Award finalist, follows the life of an African slave girl in New York City during the Revolutionary war.

Thank you, Ranger Doug, I’m glad we asked.