Introduction by Mayor Adrian Fenty
Introduction to the "The Half Had Not Been Told Me: African Americans on Lafayette Square" from the Honorable Adrian Fenty, Mayor of the District of Columbia.
Hi, I'm Adrian Fenty, Mayor of Washington, DC, and I'm pleased to welcome you to one of our city's most unique and historic places, Lafayette Square, and to introduce this audio walking tour, The Half Had Not Been Told Me: African Americans on Lafayette Square. This tour is presented by Decatur House Museum and is supported, in part, by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
This tour's title, The Half Had Not Been Told Me, is taken from a Biblical reference Frederick Douglass used to describe the beauty of the Freedman's Savings Bank and Trust building, once located on Lafayette Square. Douglass compared the experience of seeing the Freedman's Bank building for the first time to the way the Queen of Sheba, an African queen, felt upon seeing the riches of King Solomon. Douglass wrote, "The whole thing was beautiful. . . I felt like the Queen of Sheba when she saw the riches of Solomon, that 'half had not been told me'."
Lafayette Square—known first as President's Park—is a landscape with a rich and varied African-American history. Prior to emancipation, both free and enslaved African-Americans lived and worked on the Square. The area has also been home to important institutions, such as the Reconstruction-era Freedman's Savings Bank and the Belasco Theater, one of the few venues in segregated Washington where black entertainers were allowed to perform before de-segregated audiences. And it has been a place where people took a stand—from an enslaved woman who sued Henry Clay for her freedom in 1829 to citizens gathering at St. John's Church in 1963, in preparation for the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
Just like the riches of King Solomon that Frederick Douglass referred to, the African American history of Lafayette Square is indeed a treasure, but it is one that has not had significant public exposure in the past. This tour seeks to correct that oversight and, in doing so, to enrich our understanding of the history of Washington, DC and of the United States. Thank you and enjoy the tour.
Listen to:
Introduction from the Honorable Adrian Fenty, Mayor of the District of Columbia.
Call 1 (202) 595-1859,,102#. (Quicktime Version)
