History Alive

Visibility, less than a mile, with a 300-foot ceiling. We couldn't see the tops of the smoke stacks in Jacksonville this morning.
"It's not nice out," moaned Andy, "and there is no place to run to avoid it.
The road into Kingsley Plantation, a white ribbon through a wooded palmetto hammock, resisted rutting and sinking with its base and coating of tabby, crushed oyster shells, sand and water. The plantation, which grew Sea Island cotton and indigo, belonged to Zephaniah Kingsley and his wife Anna Madgigline Jai Kingsley from the Wolof people of Senegal, where he purchased her as a slave. Kingsley bought the house and land on Fort George Island in 1814, and he and his wife produced the long-fiber cotton with a work force of 60-80 slaves. After he freed Anna in 1811, she participated in business management of the plantation and acquired her own land and slaves.
"What a twist to the usual slave stories," I said, as we walked around the white-washed plantation house and the 25 remaining foundations and walls of slave cabins. Eventually Kingsley owned four plantation complexes, more than 32,000 acres and more than 200 slaves, before he died in 1843.

"He had radical views for his time," I said to Andy, "and I guess that might be why he alone resided on Fort George Island, but his beliefs also radically contradicted." Kingsley crusaded for free black rights and established the only free black republic in the hemisphere on the island of Haiti in 1837. There he moved his wife and four mulatto children in 1842, years after the U.S. acquired Florida from Spain in 1821 and harsh new U.S. government reforms curtailed free black rights, oppressed all blacks and expelled free Negros and mulattoes from the Florida Territory. Between 1828 and 1834, he published four editions of Treatise, warning about a society based on racial prejudice. But he also favored slave ownership and advocated for the continuance of slavery, the life blood of his plantations. "That's so contrary!" I said.
I read some interesting facts, history different from what I had learned in school.

1. Slaves either worked under a task system or a gang system. Kingsley, a good task master, assigned each slave a specific job on a quarter acre plot of land. Upon appropriate completion of the task, the slave was permitted to use the balance of the day as he or she chose, but slaves were also required to raise a variety of crops in their own gardens. I thought about The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. This reminded me of Jim and his obligations to the Widow Douglass and Miss Watson. Jim in the novel had free time, apparently like some of Kingsley's slaves.

2. Crops grown in the gardens often reflected the slave's African heritage.

3. Slaves sometimes maimed themselves so they would be less valuable and less likely to be sold off.

4. Children of enslaved parents automatically belonged to the mother's owner.

5. Slaves who raised indigo often lived only five to seven years. Indigo fermented faster in stale human urine, so the stench was so bad and the insects so ferocious, processing indigo was a death sentence.

6. Expressions were conveyed through song lyrics with double meanings, and religious services were held in the bayou, away from the watchful eye of the owner.

7. Archaeological evidence of beliefs includes blue beads worn for protection, chicken and deer bones buried at the door frame to guard the house and iron fragments placed under the floor as a safeguard. This plantation was the birthplace of African Archaeology in 1968.

I left feeling horror and awe about all that I didn't know concerning this turbulent time in American history. "This illustrates for me Mark Twain's vivid awareness of society," I told Andy. I think I would read and teach Twain with a different perspective now. All the subtle details about Jim in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn fit perfectly. So did Huck's hesitation to recognize Jim's humanity. Suddenly, it all made perfect sense.
Beach Boulevard Barbers in Jacksonville Beach, a sports bar with a haircut, advertised the old fashioned way--with a barber pole out front.

"I need a haircut, weather is lousy, and we have time to kill," said Andy.

"Welcome, what'll it be?" asked co-owner John.

Co-owner Connie explained, "It's part of the haircut. You get a beer or a glass of wine. This is an old-time barber shop with a modern, contemporary look and feel."

"We have an air hockey table up front, a fooz ball table in the back and a big screen TV," added John.

I sat at the bar by the front door, relaxing to the cool jazz and sipping red wine at 11:00 a.m. What a wonderful place to chill out!

"That's our mission," said John, "to have everyone who walks through our doors have a fun, relaxing experience and look forward to the next visit here at Beach Boulevard Barbers."

And Andy looked ten years younger without grey locks.

We drove along Route #202. Mansions hidden by massive gates, elaborate landscaping and colorful pansies and cabbage plants lined the road on the ocean side. Homes on the bay side, slightly more visible, were tucked between hammocks of mangrove and live oak.

Cousin Gert and her friend Dorothy welcomed us to their new condo on Jacksonville Beach, and two hours passed in no time, as we shared travel stories and caught up on 50 years of family news. What fun to learn more about history, this time on the personal level!