A Man Walks into a House

A Man Walks into a House
By: Malcolm Margasak

A Man Walks into a House

A man walks into a house.  The man isn't special, or doesn't have to be at least. He doesn't even have to be a man. The house is kind of special though. It is a historical house, like Monticello or mount Vernon or the Bishop White House. The tour guide to the house would use the imagination of the man to make him smell the chamber pots, feel the thick black smoke from the fireplace, and hear the bustle of servants. But why is the man really there? Is he just here to learn, or is there something else? Lets imagine the man is a white anglo saxon male.  Is he supposed to identify with Thomas Jefferson and fantasize about what his glorious past life would have been like?

Let's say the man is me. I am from Slavic Jewish, Irish Catholic, and white anglo saxon ancestors. White by today's standards, but not a possible property owner back in the eighteenth century. I might have had to been extremely poor or an indentured servant, so what am I supposed to think or feel? I am closer to the image of Jefferson than some, but back then I would have been far beneath him. When I walk into Monticello am I supposed to feel angry at Jefferson for being a member the evil capitalist ruling class of the 18th century? Or look up to him as someone who wrote the Declaration of Independence, or, more importantly, a member of the early American elite? Am I supposed to use Jefferson as a goal, and compete to become as rich as possible at the expense of others?   

But why would I want to be like him? He made money (minus the money he inherited) on the backs of slaves, profiting at other’s pain. He even enslaved his own children with Sally Hemmings. To enslave own your child takes a truly sick man. But the way the tour is set up certainly wants to make me like and identify with Jefferson, which I do for a certain time because I'm a white male and it's easy.

But what if the man who walks into the house isn’t me and is black like someone Jefferson would have owned?  He would have a harder time conforming to the house’s wish of identifying with Jefferson. I why should he care about Monticello and really why should I? You may say, the house isn't telling you to be any particular way, it just is.  But that is not true. The people who made the historical site a museum, the people who fund it, their beliefs and wishes shine through, and often the funders are wealthy white men, the Jeffersons of our day. I remember going on a tour of the Johnson House in Germantown. The tour guide put a heavy emphasis on the house’s history in the underground railroad, as does the website and most of it’s recent historical praise. It is owned by Johnson House Historic Site Inc. But before that when it was owned by the Germantown Women’s club, who told the story as more significant in the revolutionary war. You can see the changing ownership changes what history is brought to life. Although this is still better than the purpose being to glorify Jefferson, it is still an example that the owners of  these historical sites can make the person or persons they embody seem a certain way, kind of remold that person, also kind of remold the history. Are these really monuments to them, to tell us that they are like the Jefferson image they want you to see, your local friendly member of the elite?  Are they tryIng  to make us more accepting of them as who they are? What is their motive? There definitely is one.

Of course there are those who just say they like history. But what about history. I went to the battle of Germantown reenactment when I was younger and had a great time. My eardrums ached afterward from the explosions and the shouting, but i had a lot of fun watching people in costumes act out the battle. As a boy I was just concerned about history as a story, no more or less important than say Harry Potter, and I liked that about it. At the reenactment there were several different tables from different historical societies and organizations. I went up to chat with one and learned to join you must trace your ancestors back the the revolutionary war to join. What about history does this “society” like? The exclusivity they can artificially manufacture? The glorification of  their ancestors and by that themselves? Or do they just want a good story.

What kind of historical site would go to my ancestors. A refurbished nineteenth century firehouse in Kensington to pay homage  to the glorified Irish fire men of old? The same irish firemen who murdered Octavius Catto in cold blood?  Would this become a place where Catto is remembered, or would it become a place where the killing of him is remembered and the fire company glorified. If that is the case, I want nothing to do with it. Even if you took the racial tensions out of it, why would I want to remember the poverty of my ancestors?

I don't know how I would like history to be told. I could say in the most unbiased way possible, but every way is biased. Even if I told history it would be biased. I am not immune. I don't know how history will be told, or why we tell it. Is it because we need to learn from our mistakes in the past to not make them again? No, I think that may be part of that, but it’s bigger. I think history is told to tell something about the teller, a kind of reflection. And in our age of alternative facts, it certainly says a lot.