African American Historical Marker Program in Philadephia
We will specifically use the State of Pennsylvania African American historical marker program that was spearheaded by the archival research and political mobilization of Charles Blockson, founder of the Blockson Collection now housed at Temple University.
The historical marker program initiated by Blockson in 1990, with a grant from the William Penn Foundation, brings attention to the national significance of African Americans contributions to the historical, social, political-economic and cultural heritage of Philadelphia.
The markers show the inextricable role of the African American experience in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania: from the early settlement of Philadelphia during the colonial era, beginning with the city's first settlers in 1639, the arrival of 154 enslaved Africans in 1694 with the Quakers and the ship, Isabella; extending through the emergence of the nation’s largest population of free African Americans during the period of slavery; the pivotal role of that free black community in the abolition movement; as well as, the creation and development of some of the nation’s most important religious, educational, economic, and cultural institutions which constitute the local and national significance of Philadelphia’s historic African American community throughout the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. There are markers associated with key figures, events, socio-political movements, community organizations and institutions, and cultural activities in locations dating back 200 years in some of the oldest sections of central Philadelphia.
There are likewise, markers associated with more recent places, people, events and institutions of contemporary significance that are deeply rooted in the cultural landscape of the city at large and the black community in particular.
The African American markers were given public designation by the State of Pennsylvania Commission on Historical Landmarks through the academic research, archival collections and civic organizing efforts of Charles Blockson. They vary in their relative degree of designated significance and stature. Many of the sites are included in the National Register of Historical Places. Some of the marker sites are affiliated with The National Park Service, while others are respectively and often simultaneously affiliated with local city, county and or state governments giving them designation as historic sites.
Regardless of their respective designated stature, the larger significance of these sites arises out of the experience, phenomenon, event, movement or figures of those associated with the site itself.
Just as the aim of the State of Pennsylvania historical marker program is to enhance public awareness and education about the history of African Americans in Philadelphia, the aim of our program is to broaden the public access to information about the historical and place contexts related to those markers through the development of an online, interactive multimedia virtual heritage resource.
It will also serve to enhance that archival collection through the development of a virtual reality experience related to the significance and meaning of those historical markers. The African American historical markers and the sites or landmarks they recognize and represent are important to historians, geographers, curators, and librarians for the very fact they are sites of historical and geographic memories.
The African American historical markers and the sites or landmarks they recognize and represent are important to historians, geographers, curators, and librarians for the very fact they are sites of historical and geographic memories. This online multimedia virtual heritage resource will connect the places recognized by the markers to the significant holdings of the Blockson Collection.
These memories resonate with great significance and meaning not only to past, present and future generations of Philadelphians, they also broaden the scope of larger narratives of local, regional and national history. For the historian and geographer time and space are the fundamental reference points in the study of human society. Individual and collective memories of the past are deeply embedded in the historical, political and spatial contexts and lives of those remembrances, recollections, stories and histories as they pass from one generation to the next.
These sites of memory speak to the everyday lives of particular people, families and ethnic groups; they also illuminate larger themes of more universal significance to the national African American and American historical narrative. Heritage landmarks and markers like museums, exhibits, historic parks, libraries and archives all bring the study and teaching of diverse human experiences into more tangible, three dimensional focus for students and visitors to these sites.
