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Dispatches from President’s House, Philadelphia: Anger and Optimism

In mid-April, I had the opportunity to visit Philadelphia, accompanying my partner, Linda Ries, to her attendance at the Organization of American Historians Annual Conference.  While she sat in a windowless room listening to history, I devoured every museum in sight. It is America’s 250^th after all, and Philadelphia was where it happened.

On my way to Independence Mall on April 17^th and 18th along Market Street, I passed the President’s House Exhibit, located at the Southeastern Corner of Market and 6^th. After the Park Service’s removal of the interpretive panels, and the half-complete restoration by court order, the site had the character of a Roman ruin. What I saw at first angered me immensely. Following Trump’s Executive Order 14253, “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” (should I put that in double quotes?), the National Park Service removed all of the panels that dealt with the difficult history of George Washington’s stay in this house in Philadelphia during his two terms as president and his relationship to his enslaved workers that kept his and Martha’s home there. Following a February Federal District court order, the same National Park Service began to put the panels back, but on appeal by the Administration, the Court halted the work, so the interpretive panels are now partially restored, partially taken down.

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