Project proposal for Fall 2023 Introduction to Public History Seminar.
Questions/Abstract:
How can the modern world best honor the thinkers of the past, whose ideas led us to where we are as a collective society today? Fannie Barrier Williams was one such thinker, and someone who’s speaking and ideas were revolutionary for their time, and have created ripple effects that brought down unjust societal barriers and allowed for the strides towards equality for all people that we can appreciate in the modern day.
Narrative:
The project being presented below revolves around the question of how can the modern public best recognize and honor the people of the past who pushed for the changes to be made that have created the ideals that are today considered the norm, while in their time were wildly unorthodox and unwelcome. Focusing on Fannie Barrier Williams as such a figure to demonstrate these qualities brings particular elements of these qualities into light. Fannie Barrier Williams was an African American and women’s rights advocate, who broke boundaries several ways including being the first African American woman to join the Chicago Women’s Club, and whose additional accomplishments are not limited to the founding of the National League of Colored Women, and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. As we reflect on the value of what FBW pushed for during her time, the project being presented to honor her commitments should focus on valuable themes beyond even was she was able to accomplish. By using Williams’ legacy as a starting point, a project established to honor her can be a launch point for inspiring the public to both remember her, but also inspire new ideas as to how the legacy of herself and those like her can be considered as we look to what this type of progress might mean for our own futures.
The project being brought forward is the plan for a statue of Fannie Barrier Williams, an idea which is planned to stir conversation and thought to several degrees and ways. On one hand, an honorary statue of a figure follows suit with the traditional methods of honoring past figures, but this plan specifically is founded in conjunction with themes beyond the scope of one figure. The creation and establishment can be brought forward with the goals of raising new questions of how and why we honor such visionaries, and if collectively as a society how we can develop of methods of accepting thought that may be currently atypical, and perhaps how to spot figures in today’s world which among future generations may be studied for being ahead of their time. The intention of the statue is simply to inspire the thoughts of the general public viewing it, and to best pass along this message would be to not make it so obvious that it is explained outright, or that its entirety can be seen with the eye. The memorial statue would include three fully-shaped figures, the primary being Fannie Barrier Williams, while the two beside her to the left are similar visionaries that yet to be determined in the project. Each figure looks to the one following them, FBW being viewed by the two as the newest in line. However Williams’ looks past herself, onto three stone blocks that are yet to be carved into representing the likeness of anyone in particular. The central theme of this memorial statue is to emphasize the impacts of past visionaries like Williams’ and their accomplishments, while also presenting the theme that many like her that may exist today have yet had time to be recognized and memorialized. The exhibits that are able to best inspire thought are able to put an idea of theme into the mind of the observer without being obvious or straightforward. If within these plans a theme for the statue can artistically be displayed that inspires the viewer’s own creative thought, then it can best serve its purpose by playing on the imagination of each individual. In this way, the memorial statue can play on whichever its strengths may be within the mind of the individual, making its creative scope larger than it could be if it were plain to be seen. As viewed by the general public, their first thought may be to recognize Fannie Barrier Williams and the figures beside her, and the value of the institutions and ideas they fought for. Next would be to contemplate the meaning of the uncarved stone that stands next in line. They may even consider what figures might be living around us today, whose activism is likewise ahead of its time and yet to be fully recognized. What ideas might be unorthodox today, that will be recognized as greatly neglected truths by our next generations? The memorial would primarily play on the minds of the general public as its strength, both memorializing the great efforts of thinkers like Fannie Barrier Williams, while simultaneously echoing a theme of visionaries and how we might recognize them.
The intention for the display of the statue would be for the viewing of the general public in a public place, because its message would be shared best across a wide audience regardless of their educational or historical background. Because the statue artistically plays on the interpretation of the viewer, there is no need for baseline or background information. A plaque may be displayed honoring the names and accomplishments of the completed figures to best adhere to its wide target audience demographic. If this project were to be funded the majority of its establishment would require to be done by professional historians and professional craftsmen in the realm of building such statues. Baseline requirements that would have to be met by the end of 2024 would be a blueprint for the scale and details of the memorial, a plot of land for it to be placed on, as well as a general budget for hiring professional bodies for its construction. Concerns that may arise would be the cost of professional oversight, references, and construction of this exhibit, as a scale model of several figures has potential to be extremely expensive and time-consuming. Hopefully however the inspiration and public value the of the memorial would outway the costs, placing Fannie Barrier Williams more permanently in the spotlight of history and allowing her message to be perpetuated in another way.
Bibliography
Staten, C. (March 31 2014). Fannie Barrier Williams (1855-1944), Black Past.
Urofsky, M. (Seprember 18 2023). Dred Scott Decision, Encyclopedia Britannica.
Wallenfeldt, J. 26 Decade-Defining Events in U.S. History, Library Britannica.
Frances Barrier Williams, “The Intellectual Progress of the Colored Women of the United States Since the Emancipation Proclamation,” in The New Woman of Color: The Collected Writings of Fannie BArrier Williams, 1893-1918, ed. Mary Jo Deegan. Dekalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Press, 2002.
