I was sad to see the statue of famous abolitionist, Frederick Douglass, in Rochester, NY torn down and damaged this past week. Here’s the Douglass statue news story.
Sad for a lot of reasons but mostly sad because it shows a lack of care, lack of respect, lack of knowledge, and/or general hatred on the part of the vandals.
I’m also reminded of my fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Horton.
She made a valiant effort to teach us about our local history and how it fit into national history. In the early nineteen seventies when I was in grade school, at PS#7, in Rochester, NY, there was plenty of unrest and strife across the nation. We had forced busing in our school district, like others. There were riots across the nation, including in Rochester. And there was plenty of anti-war protest and sentiment, too.
How do you teach kids about the struggle for equality?
Mrs. Horton took a bunch of unruly ten year total olds and, after lunch/recess every day, made us put our sweaty heads down on our desks. She dimmed the lights and then she read to us for 20 minutes. Frederick Douglass’ autobiography, and then biographies of Harriet Tubman and Susan B. Anthony.
Maybe she was also trying to get a moment of peace when dealing with a pack of noisy kids, but she put those moments of peace to good use. I’ll never forget the books she read to us, and I probably would never have read/heard the whole of each book without her effort, as the writing was well beyond our reading level at the time.
I’m thankful we had Mrs. Horton to read to us, and I’m sorry to see that whomever vandalized this statue never had the benefit of someone like Mrs. Horton. No one who had read/heard/understood the lives and words of Frederick Douglass or Harriet Tubman would have pulled down this statue.
Mrs. Horton could have lectured us about the importance of Frederick Douglass and what he did for emancipation. I’m sure she could have given us a five-point outline we promptly forgot.
But nothing could have been as powerful as his own words about his years as a slave in Maryland. And wrestling with his life story a bit at a time over a period of weeks while she patiently poured that story bit by bit into us.
And Mrs. Horton didn’t feel a need to dumb the reality of his narrative down for kids. He didn’t pull punches and she didn’t fee a need to do it either. Sure we wouldn’t understand all the vocabulary, all the historical context — but we understood enough.
Thank you, Frederick Douglass and Mrs. Horton
We have so much to thank Frederick Douglass for, and others like him who have remained unnamed. Instead of feeling grateful, some individuals felt a need to express disrespect and hate of equality and freedom by tearing down a statue of a man who fought for freedom for all.
Thank you, to the memory of Mrs. Horton, and others like her. What she did matters; what teachers of a like mind have done matters; and what you do today matters.
And if you don’t know the story of Frederick Douglass, I suggest you go get a copy of his autobiography and read his own words for yourself — not someone else’s summary. If Mrs. Horton could expect a bunch of kids to understand the narrative of his life without intermediation, surely any adults reading this post are also able to read and understand his story for themselves.