Sarah Weissman – Page 6 – Maryland Humanities

The Big Jump and Urban Planning History in Druid Hill Park

Posted on September 5, 2018October 29, 2021 by Sarah Weissman

Public artist Graham Coreil-Allen spoke to us on a recent segment of Humanities Connection. Here, he uses photography to takes us through the history of Druid Hill Park’s infrastructure, its impact, and the efforts to make Druid Hill Park more accessible.

Recently a long row of orange and white plastic barriers appeared along Druid Park Lake Drive and across the 28th Street Bridge. This is the Big Jump Baltimore shared-use path. Championed by local residents, 7th District Councilman Leon Pinkett, Baltimore City Department of Transportation, and Bikemore, this temporary project counteracts decades of highway expansion with a protected space for pedestrians, wheelchair riders, and bicyclists. Neighbors and artists been creating public art along the Big Jump pathway to make it safer for all people to enjoy the cultural and health benefits of Druid Hill Park.

Auchentoroly Terrace showing how eight lanes of traffic separate West Baltimore from Druid Hill Park.

NAACP Labor Secretary Clarence Mitchell Jr. argued that increased traffic speeds through westside neighborhoods would imperil black residents effectively barred by racist real estate practices from moving to the very suburbs that the highway would serve. Shaarei Tifoloh synagogue Rabbi Nathan Drazin expressed concern that traffic would endanger children attending Hebrew school as well as the throngs of congregants who traditionally walked down the middle of Auchentoroly Terrace during the high holy days. Nevertheless, the local council members were asked by James Pollack, then head of the powerful Trenton Democratic Club, to ignore their constituent opposition and support what he considered to be a “citywide” highway effort. It didn’t hurt that plans for extending Auchentoroly Terrace just happened to end at Anoka Avenue – the calm, tree-lined street that Mr. Pollack called home.

1938 aerial photo showing neighborhood streets around Druid Hill Park before construction of the Druid Hill Expressway and the Jones Falls Expressway. Photo from the collection of Johns Hopkins University Sheridan Libraries, Maps & Atlases, Aerial Photography, 1937 – 1938 Baltimore City & Baltimore County, https://jscholarship.library.jhu.edu/handle/1774.2/32802

In 1951 Mayor Thomas D’Alesandro Jr. proposed the Jones Falls Expressway. Druid Park Lake Drive would need to be expanded to serve as a feeder road to this new highway. Ensuing years of residents’ protests were ignored and construction began in 1956. Completion of the 1948 Druid Hill Expressway and 1963 Jones Falls Expressway resulted in the widening of Auchentoroly Terrace and Druid Park Lake Drive. Two-lane, park-front residential streets became dangerous five-to-nine-lane-wide highways. These expressways literally paved the way for white flight while cutting off the surrounding working class African American and Jewish neighborhoods from the park.

2018 aerial photo of highways around Druid Hill Park. Photo from Google Maps.

Father and son bicyclists, photo by Brian O’ Doherty

Local residents deserve priority access to Druid Hill Park. For the first time in over 50 years pedestrians, wheelchair riders, and bicyclists can now safely cross the Jones Falls Expressway thanks to the Big Jump shared-use path. More work needs to be done, but the Big Jump is a step in the right direction towards reconnecting our neighborhoods with Druid Hill Park.

Read more about the history of highway development and the Big Jump at Graham Projects: https://grahamprojects.com/2018/08/the-big-jump/

Graham Coreil-Allen is a Baltimore-based public artist and organizer working to make cities more inclusive and livable through public art, radical walking tours, and civic engagement. Coreil-Allen received his MFA from Maryland Institute College of Art and has created projects for numerous spaces, places and events; including the The Deitch/Creative Time Art Parade, Eyebeam, The Baltimore Museum of Art, Washington Project for the Arts, Arlington Art Center, VistArts, Artscape, Transmodern Festival, Current Space, ICA Baltimore, RedLine, Arlington Public Art, Light City, Baltimore City, and the US Pavilion at the 13th International Venice Architecture Biennale.

The public artist lives and works on Auchentoroly Terrace in West Baltimore where he also serves as the communications specialist for the New Auchentoroly Terrace Association. Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed on our blog do not necessarily reflect the views or position of Maryland Humanities or our funders.

Exploring and Preserving African American History Through Dance

Posted on August 16, 2018October 18, 2021 by Sarah Weissman

We featured of Breai Mason-Campbell of Guardian Baltimore a dance cooperative that preserves and passes on African American folk traditions — on this week’s Humanities Connection. She discussed how we can trace cultural history through dance and what dance can tell us about belonging to a culture or nation. Because dance is such a visual medium, we decided to share an adapted version of the transcript with photos, all courtesy of Guardian Baltimore, and some other media. Listen to the audio segment here.

Breai Mason-Campbell does the Lindy Hop with a partner.

Dance tells the story of a culture and of the people who live within it. Guardian Dance Company practices, performs and passes on movements which have captured the essence of African American history.

The company looks at each epoch of American History and collects and studies everything from the Ring Shout to Lindy Hop. We unearth bodies of movement intimately connected with the way that people lived, and thought of themselves, and others.

We focus on the kinetic expression of African Americans. This invites practitioners and observers to consider the perspectives and experiences of black American communities: these communities have woven an indelible thread into the quilt of what it means to be a member of this nation.

A participant in Guardian Baltimore’s “Dance Camp” at Artscape 2018

The role of the dance television show Soul Train in the Civil Rights movement, for instance, illustrates the ways in which ideology is embodied. Hair, once straightened in conformation with Eurocentric norms, exploded into lofty afros, augmented by dashikis, African medallions and raised fists. Everything particular about blackness which had been subject to such shame and derision in the previous decade was suddenly accentuated and broadcast with pride on air to the tune of James Brown’s “Soul Power” and “Say it Loud, I’m Black and I’m Proud.”

Hips and backsides which were the subject of jokes and humiliation swung boldly back and forth in time with Funk music. This inspired “Locking,” a stylized revision of the funky chicken, originated by Don “Campbelllock” Campbell.

Mason-Campbell locking with other dancers

Today, locking is practiced competitively worldwide, now imbued with the aesthetics and expressions of international communities. At its heart, however, Locking tells the tale of black Americans’ coming out of the silence of who they were expected to be, into the bold and proud reality of self-love and creative expression. Similarly, the Lindy Hop tells the story of Harlem as the Promised Land in the North, outside of the clutches of the sharecropping South. The dance’s aerials defy gravity and the doldrums of Jim Crow.

Young dancers learn the East Coast Swing

East Coast Swing took the first, baby steps toward desegregation with Chuck Berry’s music integrating the radio. Dancers, emboldened by the energy and vitality of Rock-n-Roll, dared to cross the “color line” to jump, jive and wail.

Breaking tells the story of the indomitable spirit of youth, as hip-hop grew like a flower through cracks in the concrete of the New York, Bronx. Baltimore’s own Club Dance is a continuation of this story of youth overcoming the odds. All of these styles boldly proclaim what it means to be American.

A young man breaks at Guardian Baltimore’s Dance Camp

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed on our blog do not necessarily reflect the views or position of Maryland Humanities or our funders.

Reflections with Thurgood Marshall: Chautauqua 2018

Posted on July 24, 2018October 29, 2021 by Sarah Weissman

For the 24^th season of our Chautauqua living history series, Seeking Justice, we commemorated three Americans with a commitment to justice. Communications Specialist Sarah Weissman interviewed Brian Anthony Wilson, the Chautauqua actor who portrayed Thurgood Marshall, for his reflections on his first time as a Chautauquan and his experience portraying Marshall.

Actor Brian Anthony Wilson, probably most familiar to audiences for guest starring as Detective Vernon Holley in all five seasons of The Wire, calls playing first African American Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall “the biggest challenge of my thirty-five-year theatre career.” Wilson played Marshall in the George Stevens, Jr. play Thurgood at Olney Theatre Center last summer. He reprised his role in an excerpt from the one-man show for this year’s Chautauqua series. In a different format for the Maryland Humanities program, a dialogue with scholar Dr. Lenneal Henderson followed the performance.

Critics who reviewed Thurgood at Olney said that Wilson brings an “imposing physique, sonorous voice and disarming demeanor to the assignment,” or call the actor and the man he portrays “beautifully paired.” When reading the reviews, the challenges Wilson faced in rehearsal may come as a surprise.

Photo courtesy of Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum

“Thurgood Marshall was a fascinating and complicated man, made of much sterner stuff than me. I was ‘almost’ about to give up on this role,” Wilson confesses. “I was struggling, mightily! But my family and my director [Walter Dallas] gave me support and some tough love when I needed it.”

Wilson said the role taught him to “pull up his socks.” He informs me that Marshall’s first wife, Vivian “Buster” Burey Marshall, often said that phrase to Marshall. “I gave it [the role] all I had,” he says. Because of this, Wilson calls the role “the greatest triumph of my career.”

Wilson says the format taught him “a valuable lesson, to be prepared for anything, even performing outside! I enjoyed traveling to and fro, meeting different folks and performing at various venues with unique setups.” Wilson describes this his first Chautauqua as “very well-organized, with a friendly & supportive staff” and Chautauqua audiences as “wonderfully present, audible and attentive!”

While no longer playing the role, Thurgood Marshall continues to influence Wilson. “Thurgood inspires me to try to be a better man, father, son, and husband,” he says. “The obstacles he overcame & the injustices he fought against were nigh insurmountable but he managed to conquer them, with a keen intellect, humor, and style. You can’t help but be inspired by the man’s myriad accomplishments!”

Sarah Weissman is the Communications Specialist for Maryland Humanities. She previously served as the Communications and Fundraising Assistant at Woodbourne Center and the Marketing and Communications Director at Glass Mind Theatre, an all-volunteer company. Weissman has a B.A. in English from Goucher College, with a Concentration in Writing, as well as a Minor in Communication and Media Studies.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed on our blog do not necessarily reflect the views or position of Maryland Humanities or our funders.

A Dialogue with Frederick Douglass: Chautauqua 2018

Posted on July 12, 2018February 15, 2023 by Sarah Weissman

For the 24^th season of our Chautauqua living history series, Seeking Justice, we are commemorating three Americans with a commitment to justice. Chautauqua continues this week through July 15. Communications Specialist Sarah Weissman interviewed and wrote a feature on Bill Grimmette, the Chautauqua actor-scholar who portrays Frederick Douglass. This year is the Frederick Douglass Bicentennial, the great man having been born 200 years ago on Valentine’s Day.

Bill Grimmette tells me the following: one day, in the 1800s, a governor visited the White House and approached who he thought was the President of the United States at the time. “Mr. President?” he said. The man’s response was: “I am not the president, I’m Frederick Douglass.”

Grimmette portrays the famous abolitionist at Chautauqua 2018: Seeking Justice. “The impact of that experience on all concerned must have been deeply very profound,” he says. The anecdote is only one of multiple stories about Douglass mostly unknown to the general public. “I learned so many new and surprising things that it was difficult [to] ponder why we never knew them.” There are also missing pieces of Douglass’ legacy that not even Grimmette could discover in his research.

“Douglass had a very marvelous liberal education as can be gleaned from his many speeches and writings. Yet it is not known how he actually came by it,” Grimmette says. “It is one thing to learn to read but quite another to learn WHAT to read and yet another, still, to acquire those reading materials. What is most needed is just how Douglass acquired such a magnificent education without ever matriculating in a dedicated learning environment. To know that would be of greatest value to those shut-out from our more endowed schools.”

Grimmette has been portraying Douglass since the 1990s for the Maryland Humanities living history series. Initially, Grimmette was drawn to Douglass’ speeches related to the constitution. “I was always curious about the juxtaposition of slavery and the constitution but was pleased when Douglass told of his great dilemma along similar lines and how he resolved it,” says Grimmette. “This made me want to read anything he ever touched.”

In his different presentations as Douglass, Grimmette uses the theme to focus his research and performance. He explains the aspect of Douglass’ life that most interests him regarding Seeking Justice. “His efforts to run away from slavery, to read, to teach, and to work taught him how to earn respect first and from there, how to leverage it for justice,” Grimmette says.

In transforming his research into a living history performance, Grimmette expresses the need to capture Douglass’ storytelling ability. “The most important part of portraying Douglass is his ability to spin a yarn. He wrote in stories and was, by all accounts, a superb storyteller,” he says. “Perhaps this is why he got on so well with Abe Lincoln.”

When deciding on the content of the performances, Grimmette’s biggest challenge is deciding what information to exclude. “One wants to tell every delicious morsel of the many tales spun by, for, and about Frederick Douglass,” he says.

A Chat with Mrs. Roosevelt: Chautauqua 2018

Posted on July 6, 2018October 29, 2021 by Sarah Weissman

For the 24^th season of our Chautauqua living history series, Seeking Justice, we are commemorating three Americans with a commitment to justice. Chautauqua continues this week and runs through July 15. Communications Specialist Sarah Weissman interviewed and wrote a feature on Susan Marie Frontczak, the Chautauqua actor-scholar who portrays Eleanor Roosevelt.

“I needed a good dose of an American with a strong moral compass,” Susan Marie Frontczak says, explaining what attracted her to portray Eleanor Roosevelt. Prior to Roosevelt, Frontczak played Marie Curie and Mary Shelley. She performs as Eleanor Roosevelt for the Maryland Humanities living history series, Chautauqua. Frontczak’s first performance for Chautauqua: Seeking Justice was Friday night. Tonight, she performs in Harford County.

A woman with gray jack and gray wig gestures in front of a large American flag. — Susan Marie Frontczak as Eleanor Roosevelt

Frontczak didn’t always feel confident enough to portray Roosevelt. “At first I balked, thinking, ‘How dare I try to portray such a well-known person?’ But then I found people who didn’t know her story, and her story needs to be known.”

Some of Frontczak’s wariness came from how much Roosevelt accomplished throughout her lifetime. “I wondered, ‘How could anyone encompass such a large life in a 40-minute monologue? I’ve concluded that’s not possible.” Rather than back away, Frontczak created four different programs as the icon.

“Her life was so multi-faceted,” Frontczak says. “She was either involved in or brought attention to so many different programs, causes, and issues across forty or so years.” Fair labor laws, civil rights, and women’s representation in government numbered among the many causes Roosevelt advocated for. Frontczak names Roosevelt’s humanness and imperfections as some of the figure’s most inspirational qualities.

“Eleanor Roosevelt had to overcome layers of privilege and prejudice, assumptions, and bias embedded in both her upbringing and the times she lived through as an adult,” Frontczak says. “Watching her unlearn and overcome limitations inspires me, and I hope might inspire others.”

To Frontczak, Roosevelt serves as an accessible model for creating a more fair and just world. “If you have to be flawless to achieve what Eleanor Roosevelt achieved, we might as well all hang it up now,” she says. “Seeing her drive to learn, her willingness to change, her continued commitment to growing into the best person she could be gives me a reason to strive.” This is evident in reactions from audience members who have seen Frontczak perform as Roosevelt.

“The biggest praise is when someone from the audience (of any age) says they feel energized to become a more active citizen,” Frontczak says. “Eleanor couldn’t ask for anything more.”