Spotlighting a History of Slavery in N.Y.C.
By Troy Closson
They’re well-known Brooklyn roads and neighborhoods, among those across the city that draw their name from influential families of the past. But less familiar are the ties those families had to slavery.
A new campaign called Slavers of New York is aiming to change that by calling out — and eventually mapping — the history of slavery in New York City. The effort highlights the streets, subway stations and neighborhoods named after enslavers.
“We’ve all been given this education around, ‘Slavery happened in the South, and the North were the good guys,’ when in reality it was happening here,” said Maria Robles, one of the people behind the initiative.
[Read more about why Ms. Robles and her collaborators started the initiative.]
Here’s a look at what my colleague Julianne McShane learned about the project:
Where did the idea come from?
Elsa Eli Waithe, 33, who is Black and lives in Brooklyn, was speaking with a white friend about a Confederate monument dismantled in Virginia, their home state, last summer. Mx. Waithe recalled the friend’s dismissing the statue as a Southern issue.
But months earlier, Mx. Waithe had stumbled upon records from the nation’s first census in 1790. It listed well-known New York families. To the right of their names was a category: “slaves,” with the number of Black people each family enslaved, from 14 for the Boerums to 87 for the Lefferts.
What does the project consist of?
It’s a sticker campaign, at least for now. Ms. Robles, Mx. Waithe and their other collaborator, Ada Reso, are laying out stickers, which mimic street signs, feature the names of prominent New Yorkers and provide details on the number of slaves they owned.
The three have distributed about 1,000 stickers so far, mostly in Brooklyn, placing them onto light poles and parking meters. They hope to expand eventually throughout the five boroughs.
What other connections does New York have to slavery?
Slavery dates to the city’s very beginnings. And for enslaved people in the South who escaped to New York, a main stop on the Underground Railroad, permanent freedom was not guaranteed.
In the 17th century, Peter Stuyvesant, the namesake of sites like Stuyvesant High School and Stuyvesant Town, enslaved 15 to 30 people. The websites for the school and apartment complex do not mention that history — but the Slavers of New York stickers offer the additional information.
By Troy Closson
They’re well-known Brooklyn roads and neighborhoods, among those across the city that draw their name from influential families of the past. But less familiar are the ties those families had to slavery.
A new campaign called Slavers of New York is aiming to change that by calling out — and eventually mapping — the history of slavery in New York City. The effort highlights the streets, subway stations and neighborhoods named after enslavers.
“We’ve all been given this education around, ‘Slavery happened in the South, and the North were the good guys,’ when in reality it was happening here,” said Maria Robles, one of the people behind the initiative.
[Read more about why Ms. Robles and her collaborators started the initiative.]
Here’s a look at what my colleague Julianne McShane learned about the project:
Where did the idea come from?
Elsa Eli Waithe, 33, who is Black and lives in Brooklyn, was speaking with a white friend about a Confederate monument dismantled in Virginia, their home state, last summer. Mx. Waithe recalled the friend’s dismissing the statue as a Southern issue.
But months earlier, Mx. Waithe had stumbled upon records from the nation’s first census in 1790. It listed well-known New York families. To the right of their names was a category: “slaves,” with the number of Black people each family enslaved, from 14 for the Boerums to 87 for the Lefferts.
What does the project consist of?
It’s a sticker campaign, at least for now. Ms. Robles, Mx. Waithe and their other collaborator, Ada Reso, are laying out stickers, which mimic street signs, feature the names of prominent New Yorkers and provide details on the number of slaves they owned.
The three have distributed about 1,000 stickers so far, mostly in Brooklyn, placing them onto light poles and parking meters. They hope to expand eventually throughout the five boroughs.
What other connections does New York have to slavery?
Slavery dates to the city’s very beginnings. And for enslaved people in the South who escaped to New York, a main stop on the Underground Railroad, permanent freedom was not guaranteed.
In the 17th century, Peter Stuyvesant, the namesake of sites like Stuyvesant High School and Stuyvesant Town, enslaved 15 to 30 people. The websites for the school and apartment complex do not mention that history — but the Slavers of New York stickers offer the additional information.
