Tag: Underground Railroad

The Embrace Statue honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Coretta Scott King | Monument Unveiling on Boston Commons

Posted on by Catherine

Now there’s three centuries of striving for equality expressed in public art sculpture on Boston Commons.

photo caption: Daybreak photos on Boston Commons, January 13, 2023, a few hours before the Embrace unveiling ceremony- and the rain.

Hank Willis Thomas Monument to the Kings

The memorial by Hank Willis Thomas is installed just inside the Boston Common Parkman Plaza entrance (across from 151 Tremont St.). Today’s event precedes the public access to the site. Note: The area will be fenced off for a few more weeks before public access is cleared.

In addition to photo documentation of how the Embrace looks today as its readied for the unveiling event, there are photos of the art featured on the temporary fence wrap; the surroundings alongside the new installation and how the Embrace is set into the Boston Commons to give an idea of scale; and photos of the Robert Kraus Boston Massacre / Crispus Attucks Memorial (dedicated 1888), the Augustus St.-Gaudens Robert Gould Shaw | 54th Regiment Memorial (1897), and the John Paramino Signing of the Declaration of Independence tribute tablet (1925) for context and to illustrate their proximity. With the addition of the Embrace (2022) commission, three centuries of striving for equality– now including a tribute to a woman* rather than an allegory for the spirit of Freedom– are located on the Boston Commons within sight of the State House.

*Cyrus Dallin’s Ann Hutchinson and Sylvia Shaw Judson‘s Mary Dyer statues are on the State House grounds.

2023 January 13- morning of Embrace unveiling

Embrace is by American artist Hank Willis Thomas, with Mass Design Group architects. It’s 22 feet high and was fabricated in the Walla Walla Foundry. Thomas was inspired by a photograph of the spouses hugging when MLK was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964. When it’s open, people can walk through the heart of the sculpture. I’ll write more about it later. Hank Willis Thomas is now represented by Pace Gallery, NY.

American History – For Freedoms

The Embrace will fall on the Freedom Trail and Black Heritage trail. It’s incredibly moving to visit these liberty milestones sited in such close proximity.

Jan 23, 2023 photos emphasize site lines in relation to the new Embrace commission.

1888 Boston Massacre – Crispus Attucks obelisk

Boston Massacre – Crispus Attucks bronze by Robert Kraus. The 25 feet high obelisk marks the day of the Boston Massacre and includes a tribute to its victims.

Crispus Attucks, a freed black man, whaler, and sailor, was the first revolutionary killed in the battle for liberty.

The sculpture was inspired by Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People commemorating France’s battle to overthrow the King in 1830 (decades following the French Revolution). France’s National Assembly disclosed the Declaration to the Rights of Man and Citizen in 1789. Olympe de Gouges pamplet, Déclaration des droits de la femme et de la citoyenne (the Declaration of the Rights of Women and the (Female) Citizens) came soon thereafter.

Boston Commons: Boston Massacre | Crispus Attucks Memorial on left; Embrace King tribute between the trees, past the temporary fencing; State House dome on right. Rainy day scenes are 2023. Blue skies were March 2018. All photos: C. Ryan

1925 DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE TABLET

Sculptor John Paramino, after (John) Trumbull’s monumental painting completed in 1818 and installed in the Capitol, The Signing of the Declaration of Independence (Aug 1776), tablet set into granite with eagle carving and produced at the Gorham foundry, Providence, RI.

Closer to home in Gloucester, Massachusetts, the bronze doors on the A. Piatt Andrew bridge are by Paramino.

1897 54th Regiment Robert Gould Shaw memorial

Augustus Saint-Gaudens took nearly fourteen years to finish. The memorial was unveiled May 31, 1897. Charles McKim designed the site. The names are carved at the back The paths slope down in the direction of the new statue.

People on their phones that morning whether standing, seated or walking.

June 2022- BEFORE installation

site work

Rainy day scenes, today, Jan 13, 2023. Before scenes depicting site preparation and leafy trees dated June 2022. photos: C. Ryan

About the Embrace memorial Fence Wrap Artists

featuring Rixy Fernandez, Yotron the Don, Malakhai Pearson, Harry Scales, Zahirah Nur Truth, and Ngoc-Tran Vu

1960 – Religion, Learning, Industry

Wayfinding: Commissioned for a 1958 build out for Parkman Plaza designed by Shurcliff and Merrill, this tribute celebrates Boston’s industriousness, scholarship and spiritual history. Sculptors Arcangelo Cascieri & Adio di Biccari completed the series before a 1960 installation. The unveiling dedication was in 1961. This is the closest park entrance to see the Embrace.

blue sky photo: C. Ryan, March 2018 – Religion, Industry, Knowledge Boston Tribute 1961

President Lincoln appointed postmaster, abolitionist, Main Street proprietor, gold star dad, overseer of the poor, gardener: William H. Haskell house history Pleasant St. Gloucester, Mass.

Posted on by Catherine

Annotated illustration: Note gardens on properties abutting City Hall. William Haskell’s lots spread between Dale and Pleasant (#44 now) streets and beyond where Carroll Steele is located now, numbered 32 Pleasant Street, rear when he lived there. On the 1884 Hopkins and 1899 Stadly maps the lot is identified where the new post office is now.

Another Haskell (Cpt. John Haskell) was associated with 34 Pleasant (former Moose Home*), and Melvin Haskell with 136 Main Street. *The house history trail for 34 Pleasant (THEN 26 Pleasant): Pearce-J. Haskell-Calef-Moose Lodge (razed 2011)-Cape Ann Museum parking lot. This area could be an African American history stop spotlighting both abolitionist and antiabolitionist connections.

Street numbers were shifted. Behind #44 Pleasant Street now (below)

44 Pleasant Street Gloucester Mass_former home William H Haskell_20180817_©c ryan (2)
44 Pleasant Street 2018

 

William Humphrey Haskell

Dates: b.January 23, 1810 – d.August 26, 1902
Parents: Eli (b. 1776 Gloucester, MA) and Lydia (Woodbury Bray) Haskell
Brother: Epes
Grandfather: Elias Haskell
First Wife and two daughters:  Sarah Ann Bray (1811-1836) “died September 12, 1836 leaving two daughters* now deceased, one of whom (Sarah*) married a Mr. (Thomas*) Symonds of Reading and the other (Judith*) married Edwin Bradley of Rockport and was the mother of Mr. Edwin Archer Bradley* of Gloucester, Mass.” E Archer Bradley was Captain Sylvanus Smith son-in-law.  E Archer Bradley is listed in the 1913 Polk directory as Vice President of the Gloucester Mutual Fishing Insurance Co and Director Rocky Neck Marine Railway Company.

Second Wife and six children: Mary S. Smith (died August 15, 1889) Married July 19, 1838. They had six children: “William G. Haskell of Washington, DC, Col. Edward H. Haskell and Charles A Haskell of Newton, Frank A. Haskell of California and Mrs. Saddie, wife of Samuel W. Brown of this city. One son, Asaph S. Haskell, laid his life on the altar of his country at Morehead City, N.C., September 28, 1863, of yellow fever while a member of Co. C, Twenty-third Regiment, where he had gone awaiting transportation home, his death occurring on the date of the expiration of his term of enlistment.”
Raised: West Gloucester, learned the trade of shoemaker according to obituary
Gloucester 250th Anniversary: served as Vice President of 250th celebration committee
Residences: 44 Pleasant Street (was between Dale and Pleasant streets and beyond where Carroll Steele is located now) formerly address 32 Pleasant Street, rear– either may have evidence Undergound Railroad. Haskell’s lots spread between Dale and Pleasant.* Another Haskell (Cpt. John Haskell) was associated with 34 Pleasant (former Moose Home) and Melvin Haskell with 136 Main Street.

Biographical information I dug up and researched then confirmed at Gloucester Archives August 29th with a special thanks to Sandy and Sarah with Gloucester Achives. I wanted to confirm Haskell’s address and home, because streets and numbers change on maps over time, and because I knew Sandy could help best with tracking down cemetery information about Haskell’s first wife and the daughters’ names missing from records and I wanted to spotlight her dedicated efforts.

Haskell’s first wife is buried in West Gloucester- historic Sumner St. Cemetery. Haskell and his first wife had two daughters. Sarah Ann Frances, born September 28, 1832 in Gloucester, died young, in December 1853. She married Thomas S. Symonds July 1851. (Haskell and his second wife named one of their daughters, Sarah “Seddie” Symonds Haskell, after his first child.)  The second daughter, Judith Goldsmith, born February 20, 1836, married Edwin Archer Bradley on November 8, 1854. 

 

OBITUARY WAS FRONT PAGE NEWS

“OLDEST MALE RESIDENT DEAD: William H. Haskell Closes Life at Age of 92 years- An Original Abolitionist and Life-long Republican

Willilam H Haskell Gloucester Mass front page article obituary
Continue reading “President Lincoln appointed postmaster, abolitionist, Main Street proprietor, gold star dad, overseer of the poor, gardener: William H. Haskell house history Pleasant St. Gloucester, Mass.” →