Testimony of Congressman Clarence J. Brown

Before The

Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs

May 2, 1980

Good morning, Senator Glenn, it is indeed a pleasure for me to be here this morning to discuss a subject so dear to my heart and to share the witness stand with my many good friends from the Wilberforce community.

During the late 60's I came to the conclusion that there was a growing racial rift between the people of this nation. I believed that among white Americans this was the result of both the ignorance of the plight of Black Americans and an ignorance of the tremendous contributions Black Americans had, and were continuing to make, to our society. Meanwhile, the decades of frustration over the failure of the American dream for Black Americans and their lack of opportunity, aggravated by what seemed at times an almost conscious national attempt to exclude their culture and history, generated a growing conflict. It was in this context that I hit upon the concept of a National Museum of Afro-American History and Culture. It seemed to me that such an institution could give dramatic focus to both races of the importance of Afro-American culture to the American culture. I saw in this institution a great deal more than a mere building with four walls and artifacts because its charge was much larger: the gulf of centuries would not be bridged by bricks but by enlightenment. What I envisioned was a Black Smithsonian that would become involved in many aspects of our society on many and varied formats. I was able to complete my research and drafting in early 1968, and in March of 1968 I introduced my bill to create a National Museum of Black History and Culture. In a matter of weeks Dr. Martin Luther King was murdered and our worst fears became reality. We have kept at this project all these years. I remain convinced that our nation needs this institution. I am shocked and outraged at the incidents of violence and hate that so graphically indicate just how far we must still go. Knowledge of all our past will produce the social awareness and enlightenment that will promote change without suffering and confrontation. And God knows there has already been enough suffering and confrontation to last us all.

Our museum concept is not merely a nice idea--it is an absolute necessity; and Wilberforce, as the focus of three historical trends of significance to Black Americans, is the most suitable place to locate this museum.

The first trend was the nucleus of a Black settlement in the Tawawa Springs area (later called Wilberforce) in 1856. This evolved when Noah Spears, a Kentucky slaveholder, brought sixteen of his slaves to the community, purchased plots of land for each one and gave them their freedom. They and their descendants farmed the land in the area during subsequent years.

The second trend was the experiment in higher education for the Black population that developed about the same time. The Methodist Episcopal Church (White) secured a charter in 1856 establishing Wilberforce University to provide higher education especially for Black people. Through the efforts of one of the most notable Black churchmen of the 19th century, Daniel Payne, the institution was able to survive the ravages of the Civil War and continues to operate down to the present day. Its value to the Black historical experience was much more than the evolution of a higher education center for Afro-American youth. Equally important was the forging together of famous Black and White personalities, who demonstrated interest and concern for the project and eagerly pledged themselves to its survival.

In the germination years, such nationally famous Blacks as Frederick Douglass, abolitionist leader, statesman, editor, orator; John M. Langston, Minister to Haiti, member of Congress, educator, attorney; Charles Reason, professor on the faculty of New York Central College; Ebenezer Bassett, Minister to Haiti, educator; James McCune Smith, abolition leader, physician, writer, were all members of the board of trustees.

Martin Delaney, physician, writer, statesman and the man Abraham Lincoln characterized as the most intellectual Black man he had met, was a frequent visitor to the campus and a close.friend of Daniel Payne. Later on, the names of Blacks like W.E.B. Dubois, Mary Church Terrell, W.S. Scarborough appear as faculty members. Famous Whites of the period who were impressed by the educational effort were Salmon P. Chase, Justice of the Supreme Court; Charles Avery, educational benefactor; Gerrit Smith, wealthy abolitionist and General Oliver Howard, head of the Freedmen's Bureau, among others.

The educational experiment fathered a combined Normal and Industrial Department in 1887; a theological seminary in 1891; and the first ROTC unit in a Black college in 1894.

The 19th century tradition carried over into the 20th and today, two schools of higher education occupy the old Tawawa Springs site. Wilberforce University continues as a church related institution. In 1964, it pioneered the first Cooperative Education Program in a Black college. Central State is state related and offers the standard higher educational program. Today, these two schools perpetuate the Black historical tradition that began more than 120 years ago, when the Underground Railroad made Tawawa Springs one of its way-stations in transporting approximately 40,000 Black slaves through Ohio in search of freedom from bondage.

The third trend involved the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the most powerful Black institution in America at mid-century. Daniel Payne became a bishop of the church in 1852. He moved to Tawawa Springs in 1856 and continued his work as a highly respected church leader. By the time he maneuvered the purchase of Wilberforce University on behalf of the A.M.E. Church in 1863, he was also the single most powerful figure in the A.M. E. Church circles. From this position of strength, Daniel Payne's famous home, "Evergreen Cottage," became the meeting place of the high and low throughout African Methodism and Wilberforce, the central focusing point of the A.M.E. Church.

For forty years, Payne was a bishop in the church. For over twenty of those years, after the death of Bishop Paul Quinn in 1872, he was Senior Bishop, a position of added prestige and power. Throughout most of those years, Payne

made Wilberforce the center of the activities of this church.

What better place for a collection of the many facets of contribution to the American culture by the Black culture than a place where Blacks and Whites together took their early stand for freedom?

Wilberforce, Ohio, is a center of Afro-American History and Culture geographically located in the heartland of America. More than half of the nation's population resides in areas that are within a day's drive of Ohio. Fifteen miles west of Wilberforce is the location of the renowned National Air Force Museum at WrightPatterson Air Force Base and less than an hour's drive to the north is the home of the Neil Armstrong Air and Space Museum maintained by the Ohio Historical Society.

The creation of a major collection, display, and cultural center in the form of an Afro-American Museum offers a special educational focus within a day's drive of the most concentrated part of the U.S. population which would create an increased public awareness (among both Black and White) of Afro-American participation in, and contributions to, the history and culture of the United States.

The establishment of the National Museum of Afro-American History and Culture near Wilberforce will significantly enhance this nation's ability to recognize, understand, and pay tribute to the great achievements made by Americans of African heritage. This museum would also create a worthwhile institution dedicated to the research and preservation of Afro-American genealogy, memorabilia and artifacts, placing emphasis on contributions in the areas of arts, science, technology, religion, education, politics, sports and entertainment.

The bill before this committee, S. 1814, which Senator Glenn and I drafted, establishes a commission composed of distinguished Americans representing the Black historic and cultural communities of interest from throughout the United States. This Commission would be charged with developing programs to promote an understanding of the history, everyday events, problems and lifestyles of Black Americans. This Commission would also establish a National Center of Afro-American History and Culture at Wilberforce, Ohio. This Center would be a national repository of history and culture, a research institute and an exhibition for visitors and serious students. It would provide representative and significant samples of what Afro-Americans have built out of clay, stone, metal, and wood. It would also illustrate what Afro-Americans have built of themselves. It would be a place where all Americans could see and feel the efforts of a single race.

It would develop programs and exhibits that express major aspects of AfroAmerican history and culture: psychological, physiological, spiritual, social and economic. The Center's staff would have the responsibility to present the results of research through the most effective techniques available. Finally, the Center would be tasked with developing plans and programs that will enhance and strengthen the existing network of museums across the country that display the cultural and historic contributions of Black Americans.

Mr. Chairman, I urge the committee to favorably consider this important measure which is so crucially needed and so long overdue. Thank you.

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Senator GLENN. The first witness will be James Tobin, Associate Director for Management and Operations of the National Park Service. Second is the Honorable Č. J. McLin of the Ohio House of Representatives who lives in that area. We will have a panel, if they have arrived by then, of Dr. Charles Taylor, president of Wilberforce University, and Dr. Lionel Newsome, president of Central State University. Then another panel of Mr. Joe Flatter, Greene County Commissioner; Mrs. Vivian Lewis, president of the Wilberforce Property Owners and Voters Association, Inc.; Dr. Paul McStallworth, historian, Greene County, Ohio; and Mr. Snyder Harland of the Greene County NAACP. So there are two panels in addition to the people who will appear individually. I would be glad to have you stay.

Representative BROWN. Thank you very much. I will.

Senator GLENN. Mr. Tobin, we would be glad to have you join us this morning. Mr. Tobin is Associate Director for Management and Operations of the National Park Service.

We will receive your statement or an abridged version thereof. In either event, the entire statement will be included in the record. TESTIMONY OF JAMES TOBIN, ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR FOR MANAGEMENT AND OPERATIONS, NATIONAL PARK SERVICE, ACCOMPANIED BY ART ECK

Mr. TOBIN. Good morning, Mr. Chairman.

The Department of the Interior is pleased to submit the following testimony concerning S. 1814 which, if enacted, would create a National Afro-American History and Culture Commission, which in turn would be responsible for the development of a definitive construction and operation plan for a National Center for Afro-American History and Culture. This would be headquartered in Wilberforce, Ohio.

The bill would also authorize the establishment of the Col. Charles Young home as the Wilberforce National Historic Site, under the administration of the National Park Service.

On June 22, 1979, the Department of the Interior submitted to Congress, as required by Public Law 94-518, a suitability/feasibility study on a proposed national museum of Afro-American history and culture at or near Wilberforce, Ohio. In transmitting the study, Congress was advised the administration opposed the creation of a national museum at Wilberforce.

This position was based on two principal considerations: first, that national museums are properly placed under the administration of the Smithsonian Institution and located in Washington, D.C.; and second, that the museum proposed for Wilberforce should be essentially a non-Federal venture competing alongside our country's many other fine private, local, and State museums for Federal assistance from the National Endowment for the Arts and Humanities and HEW's Institute of Museum Services.

S. 1814 would not establish a museum as such but it would lead to the creation of a National Center for Afro-American History and Culture, to be headquartered in Wilberforce. We are not dissuaded from the conclusion that the center's function and purposes are the same as those of a museum and, thus, must again voice our opposition to this proposal.