The history of Timbuctoo is something I have never read or heard about, which concerns me given that I've grown up in Central New York. The New York Folk Lore Society has built an exhibition to try and preserve the history of this little known community. Here's what I learned:
Gerrit Smith's motivation for giving the African American settlers land in the Adirondacks was that in order to vote in New York, a citizen had to own $250 in property. The freed slaves of the 1840s and 50s did not have the money or the resources to acquire that land and where therefore effectively prohibited from participating in American Politics. There were over three thousand African American "grantees"who received 40 to 60 acres of Adirondack Land in hopes of establishing a life for their families and community for their peers. In the end, 50 out of three thousand families moved north. Most families were from the slums of Brooklyn with no training and no knowledge of agriculture. It would seem that the lack of experience in agriculture and the rough land of the Adirondacks doomed yet another Adirondack utopia from taking root.
NY times article on the exhibit: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/19/nyregion/north-elba-journal-recalling-timbuctoo-a-slice-of-black-history.html
The NY Folklore Society article: http://www.nyfolklore.org/pubs/voic29-1-2/exhibit.html
Farmers of North Elba, What's left of Timbuctoo
Photo Credit: Blue Mountain Adirondack Museum
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ReplyDeleteCorinne, reading this was very insightful. I had vaguely heard of Timbuctoo, but was not sure of its specifics. Also, while reading Cloudsplitter, I was curious about and googled how many African Americans resided in Adirondacks during the 1840s. On the Adirondack Almanac website, I found a chart that summarizes findings from the 1820-1970 consensus. Between Essex and Franklin County, 33% and 1% of these communities identified themselves as African American, respectively. I thought this was extremely interesting, and it gave me a better sense of the demographics of the Adirondacks during this time. Check out the chart at http://www.adirondackalmanack.com/2008/02/african-american-history-essex-county-expulsions.html.
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