I’m sure it’s not all of them, but I toured Jefferson’s plantation (Montecello) and most of the tour was discussing his problematic actions, slaves, etc. Definitely paid proper respect.
Mixed feelings here. I have been through so many of these places; in reality, they run the gamut from whitewashing slavery (and post-slavery indentured servanthood) to making slavery itself front and center.
Do not discount the ability of plantation houses to educate, inform, and make real what many people have only seen on tv or in movies. It’s one thing to watch North and South or Roots and think you know something, and quite another to stand in the slave cabins of an actual plantation, knowing that your ancestors were there or but for an accident of birth, they were not.
Personally, I think EVERY American should have to go to a real plantation that has recreated or restored slave quarters and a living illustration of slave life, and see for themselves what it’s like to live twelve to a tiny cabin, or think about being the author/inventor of ingenious machinery and systems worth millions in today’s cash only to see yourself excised from your own work and watch your master’s name be placed on it, or even just to see with your own eyes the overwhelming difference in living conditions: the wattle and daub on the slave huts a few hundred yards away from the hand painted murals imported jacquard silks adorning the walls of the big house.
Why? So many people today are convinced they’d never be a slave that they can’t even spot the current movement of the entire country back to that system. These Trump stans have NO idea that beyond the religion, beyond the demolition of women’s rights and the embrace of constant fear, the entire point is to recreate a ruling class while the rest of us work for company scrip down the company store.
So I say let 'em visit some plantations and see for themselves what an accident of birth plus an authoritarian system can do to your life. America may well have been free for white men in the slavery years, but it sure as hell wasn’t for anyone of color, nor for most women. Maybe some of them will get a clue.
Thus I think it’s just as dishonest to history to discard these places as it is to embrace them unquestioningly. Instead, go – and if they’re not already, demand they show the truth about what really happened there. It’s the reason Auschwitz is still open and maintained as a museum, and frankly I think that should be required visiting as well. But if it’s not up to par, you can be the change you want to see.
What I mean is that if you ever find yourself in one and they’re whitewashing the history (and it’s history you know yourself) you can absolutely make your own tour include those tidbits. Study before you go so you can know to ask where the “servants” lived, and then ask if they were really slaves. Ask who taught the young daughter her music, and how much more that skilled slave cost in relation to the unskilled slaves. Ask when slaves were manumitted, and by whom, and why. Etcetera.
I’m not saying torture the tour guide, lol. But you can very honestly ask these questions, sprinkled into the conversation very politely and with respect for others in the tour, and add, “I wish you’d include this in your presentation, because it’s an important part of history.” Then write the house owner, leave feedback: it’s one of the few places left where if you say you want them to do this, they very likely will, because they live and die on every penny of your tourism money. Especially now, post-pandemic.
Or you can just skip those altogether and go to the ones that really are trying to do right by the history. The Whitney is one, down in Edgard, LA, and there are others in that area that are doing the same, like Laura. If you’re looking for places to go, know that a very good sign is whether they have bothered to recreate or restore the slave quarters, and/or are supporting studies and archaeological digs at the slave quarter sites, like Boone Hall in Charleston. They can’t change what their ancestors did, but they can sure as hell do right by what remains, and some are doing an excellent job. So don’t count those out.
But know in advance that because slave quarters were almost always made of the shittiest materials with the least amount of labor dedicated to them, and absolutely were NOT maintained post-Emancipation, houses like the Whitney are quite rare. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Whitney is the only complete house left, though I don’t know for a fact whether that’s the case.
Personally, I prefer not to visit any place that is still owned by the original family; I still have a truly bad taste in my mouth from Biltmore and the Vanderbilt-Cecil family that owns it, because the last time I went (20+ years ago now) visitors were subjected to this truly shitty, self-exonerating 20 minute video that did nothing but talk about how very, very well ALL the “servants” of the estate were treated at all times in every minute and what valued fucking “members of the family” they were and how very privileged the family up at the big house was to have such fine people on the estate to care for it, etc. I don’t think the word “slave” was ever used, it was “friends” and “valued partners” and “our Biltmore family” and shit like that. Jesus fucking christ it was bad. I can take ipecac if I ever need to puke, didn’t need that. Even if they don’t play it anymore, I’ll still never go back.
But now you know. They’re all different, and they can ALL be used to make better, more thoughtful and knowledgeable people of their visitors, if they are made to be.
I agree required visiting would be a great thing. I’m not sure if it’s required but it’s at least extremely common in germany to visit the nearest KZ at some point, and I think that in particular drives home the horrors quite well (even if the response to the palestinian genocide and the popularity of the AfD shows that it’s clearly not working perfectly, but I guess that’s impossible).
I read your whole post and then started laughing at your video description.
It sounds like an HR video new hires are required to watch where some over the top 50 year old woman who failed her realtor examine welcomes you to your new work family.
Thank you for the suggestions of the tours. The white washing is despicable, and it will only get worse unless people call it out.
It sounds like an HR video new hires are required to watch where some over the top 50 year old woman who failed her realtor examine welcomes you to your new work family.
Lol, yes. In a nutshell. That description is actually very close to the mark. If I recall correctly it was a female member of the Cecil family of about that mature age who was smiling so forcefully and so desperate to seem nice that I wondered if she was doing it at gunpoint. It was excruciatingly obvious that someone had given them the DEI speech and said “you have to do this if you want to shut down criticism of your past labor practices.” So they did. It didn’t work.
In truth, the Vanderbilt-Cecils were no better than any other Golden Age employers, and given some of the credible history, among the worst. I think they would give anything to go back to those days and force the rest of us to go back with them to serve them – but now they can’t afford to keep up the big houses without us plebes paying admission, so they have to act suddenly egalitarian if they want to continue to live there. I hope she choked on it, lol.
EDITED TO ADD: They have the same kind of shit on the Wikipedia page for George Washington Vanderbilt II, how nice he was to all the little estate children and gave them presents even if they couldn’t make it to the Christmas party. Jesus. I don’t want to shit on one man’s kindness, if in fact all that is true, but that’s what that entire video was made of. A look at the talk page reveals the involvement of the Biltmore Estate in the maintenance of the Wiki page.
Plantations didn’t stop operating post-slavery, they just had to actually hire workers.
And anyway, over here plantation tours play more on the supernatural-haunted aspect that sort of permeates our culture. We still regard slavery as a tragedy, nobody is at a plantation celebrating the oppression. It’s more like an observation of an outdated mode of life.
It’s like a tour of a medieval castle. Do you realize how much fucked up shit happened to literally everyone in castles during the dark ages? Does that necessarily mean that wanting to see a castle, complete with murder holes in the walls and hole-in-the-ground dungeons that are designed to never be able to get out, is wrong on a moral basis?
The holocaust was an actual, devastating tragedy. Comparing it to the operation of plantations is pretty dishonest and mostly just feels like reaching for a reason to be “morally superior to those dirty capitalist Americans,” especially considering lots of plantations didn’t use slaves even when it was legal to do so.
There is a hotel near me in the deep south that has some amazing landscaping and I’d love to go see the flowers… but it’s also a former plantation and I just can’t see myself enjoying what it is now, knowing the same sort of assholes will be profiting from my visit.
to me, that one would depend on the marketing. if they market it as a plantation experience then that’s a bit fucked.
I don’t think that former plantain land should be cursed to never be used or repurposed again. that’s giving them too much power. those slavers weren’t capable of fouling the earth itself with their bullshit.
keeping some as museum’s is probably good, but so much land down there was used for that. repuposing it and washing the misery out is probably the other thing we should be doing with that land.
I’m going to New Orleans for vacation next week and one of this items tentatively on our todo list is visiting Whitney Plantation which we specifically chose because it’s stated goal is to educate people on the history and legacy of slavery in the U.S.
Perhaps I’m naive and have been sucked in by marketing? What do y’all think? Still bad?
I would think most tours of historical places are for education. I’d be curious if there was a plantation that doesn’t have the same goals as the one you mention. It is important we never forget and we continue to educate about what our country did.
If you’re going to be down in Edgard (pronounced “Eddurd” by the locals) on the Highway 18 plantation row then know there are many others in the same area, some of which are also trying to do the right thing by their slavery history, though the Whitney is totally focused on the slavery aspect, and you won’t find that in many other places.
Laura Plantation is one I can think of down there that also has extensive slavery focus and reconstructions, if you’re open to that. If I think of any others I’ll update this comment; it’s been a few years since I last went and they all start to blend after a while, lol.
The plantation area is a bit of a drive from New Orleans, but once you’re there you’re there, so you can get in two or three historical sites in a day if you want. My pro tip is that there’s literally nothing else in Edgard, so make sure you bring a cooler with lunch for everyone and lots of cold beverages, because you’re gonna be doing a lot of walking, and you’ll get hungry long before you make it back to New Orleans.
EDITED TO ADD: Evergreen Plantation is one of the ones with extensive slave buildings and recreations, and it too is down on plantation row in Edgard, so check it out. It is also on the Louisiana African American Heritage Trail and has a big focus on the entire history, not whitewashing or leaving out the slavery, as well as actively sponsoring a slavery database and genealogical studies. The Evergreen Plantation website - be sure to check out the virtual tour
I see. That’s actually easier for you because you won’t have to try to find the houses you want to see and you won’t have to drive. Instead of a cooler bring a big snack bag (wrap cold drinks in face towels from your hotel), because there are plenty of places outside most of the big houses to sit and eat. Snacks on site – if they even have them – always cost a fortune, so this way you have options.
And be sure to check out all the proposed plantations on the tour before you go, starting with Wikipedia and working out from there. I wrote a much longer comment upthread, but the best way to know whether a given house is doing right by its own history is whether they have bothered to recreate or restore the slave quarters, and/or are supporting studies and archaeological digs at the slave quarter sites. Both Laura and Evergreen have that. But you should already have a list, so it will be easy to check out. Have a great trip!
The thing is that that’s rare. Most plantations are advertising their tours as basically “come look at pride and prejudice and the beauty of the antebellum south” and not “come bear witness to some of the horrific sins of our ancestors”.
Okay what would you call a volkswagen plant that used slave labor? Or a defense contractor that used slave labor, or a pharmaceutical plant that used slave labor and tortured humans for “mefical research”? Is a plantation “special” because they grew plants?
No. It’s “special” because people want to quickly gloss over the massive concentration camps that drove the agricultural south and other states.
Sure, it’s a plantation, and a volkswagen plant, and a military contractor facility. Sure. Nothing to see.
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