Slave Patrols in the President's Neighborhood
Thomas Smallwood detailed the circumstances of his enslavement and life as a free Black man living in Washington City in...
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Thomas Smallwood detailed the circumstances of his enslavement and life as a free Black man living in Washington City in...
Often, the accomplishments and contributions of enslaved people are lost to history—undocumented, ignored, or forgotten by successive generations. One of...
Although Michelle Obama was the first African-American first lady of the United States, African Americans have been integrally involved in...
Charles Willson Peale is synonymous with eighteenth-century portraiture. His depictions of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and other famous...
Through research and analysis of written accounts, letters, newspapers, memoirs, census records, architecture, and oral histories, historians, museum professionals, and...
Without photographs, paintings, or other visual representations of the Decatur House Slave Quarters from the antebellum period, it is difficult...
Paul Jennings was born in 1799 at Montpelier, the Virginia estate of James and Dolley Madison. His mother, an enslaved woman...
Elias Polk was born into slavery in 1806 on a farm owned by Samuel Polk, father of the future president of...
The New Years’ Day reception became a White House tradition with President John Adams in 1801 and ended with President Herbert Ho...
Speaking before the United States House of Representatives in 1825, congressman James K. Polk described American slavery as “a matter which re...
In 1818, John Gadsby was assessed and taxed for owning thirty-six enslaved individuals in Baltimore—including two young women named “Maria” and “K...
In several ways, James Hoban’s life resembles the classic immigrant success story. Born to a modest family in County Ki...