You are standing in front of a graphic panel and artifact case titled “The Brown Family.” To your left is a reader rail titled “Window on the Past: Modern Farming Techniques.” To your right is a reader rail titled “Window on the Past: Agricultural Decline.”

The panel in front of you includes text and two images. The case below it includes four groups of artifacts with labels.

The main text on the panel reads:

The Brown Family
The Brown family were African American tenant farmers who worked the land near Woodlawn from the late 1800s to the mid-1900s. Archaeologists recently uncovered the remains of the Brown family’s house on SERC’s campus. They recovered these artifacts from the site.

The accompanying photo shows the remains of the Brown family’s house. The photo depicts an archaeological dig site in the dirt surrounded by trees.

The secondary text reads:

The Mill Swamp Community
Members of the Brown family still live in the nearby Mill Swamp area. This historic African American community was established by freedmen and former slaves in the 1830s near a grist mill. It was home to African American churches, one of which remains today. During segregation, local children attended the Mill Swamp School, which was later renamed for scholar, diplomat, and Nobel Laureate Ralph J. Bunche. Today, the former school is a community center celebrating local African American history and culture.

The accompanying black-and-white photo shows The Mill Swamp School, today the Ralph J. Bunche Community Center. It shows a small rectangular building with a slanted roof.

The artifact case below includes four groups of artifacts with labels.

The labels read:

Farming
Tenant farmers, like the Brown family, found it difficult to grow enough crops to pay for their rent, food, and supplies. Many tenant farmers continued to till fields by hand, just as their ancestors had done.

Recovered from the site of the Brown family house: 
1. Curry comb used to brush horses, ca. late 1800s to early 1900s
2 and 3. Horseshoes, ca. 1900s. The larger horseshoe was probably for a large draft horse that pulled farm equipment.
4. Hay fork head, ca. 1900s
5. Handwrought iron hoe blade, ca. late 1800s to early 1900s

Fuel
While the Sellman family transitioned to burning coal to heat their house sometime in the 1800s, this splitting wedge and the lack of coal ash provide evidence that the Brown family continued to burn firewood.

Recovered from the site of the Brown family house: 
6. Wood-splitting wedge, ca. late 1800s to early 1900s

Food
Like many African American tenant farmers of the period, the Brown family subsisted largely on what they could grow with their own hands. They canned and preserved food to tide them over until the next harvest.

Recovered from the site of the Brown family house: 
7. Lid for a mason jar, ca. 1902 to 1964
8 and 9. Fragments of plain whiteware plates, ca. 1900s

How Did This Get Here?
Archaeologists recovered this 1889 Paris World’s Fair medallion from the site of the Brown family’s house, but they don’t know how it came to be there. International travel was out of reach for tenant farmers at the time. How do you think this got here?

Recovered from the site of the Brown family house:
10. Paris World’s Fair medallion, 1889

Think About It . . .
How are the objects in this case similar to or different from the objects found at Woodlawn? What does this tell us about how the Brown family lived compared to how the Sellman and Kirkpatrick-Howat families lived?