Ask students how and why we commemorate the past. Encourage students to think about how places, holidays, or community events pay tribute to people in the past. Focus on memorials: How do memorials show what people think is important about the past?

Display photograph 1 and photograph 2  of the Whitney Plantation’s Wall of Honor memorial. Zoom in and out for students as you are able. Discuss: 

  • What is the area like around the memorial? Describe the location/space.
  • What does the memorial look like? Describe details about the memorial’s “visuals.”
  • Are there any signs, placards, or text on the memorial? What do they tell us?
    • What type of information is displayed about each individual in the memorial? Why might the information be limited?
  • What thoughts and emotions does the memorial evoke for you? Can you think of different ways the memorial might make others feel?
  • What do you think is the memorial’s purpose and in what ways is it effective? 

Next, tell students they are going to create a class memorial to freedom seekers from 18th-century Virginia. Distribute one primary source to each student along with a sheet of paper. (This activity can also be done using digital illustration tools/platforms.) Ask students to underline or highlight information in the source about each individual freedom seeker. Information will vary by source, but might include: 

  • Name 
  • Approximate birth year (calculate by subtracting the age listed from the year of the primary source) 
  • Skills and experiences
  • Personality traits
  • Languages spoken 
  • Places lived

Instruct students to transcribe their individual’s information on the piece of paper, as they will use these pieces of paper in constructing a class memorial. Then lead a discussion: To what extent the advertisements reveal the skills, personalities, and choices of the freedom seekers? To what extent do they reveal slaveholders’ biases? 

Next, lead the class in planning and creating their classroom memorial:

  • What do they think the area around the memorial should look like? Why?
  • What should the memorial itself look like? (ex. Same as the Whitney Plantation Wall of Honor? Or different in some way(s)?) Why?
  • What kinds of signs/placards/texts do they want to add to the memorial? Why?
  • What thoughts and emotions does creating this memorial evoke for students?
  • What do students think is the purpose of this memorial? How are they effectively achieving that purpose via their design and included content? 

As a concluding activity, ask students to work individually or in small groups to create a dedication speech, poem, or historical marker to accompany the class memorial. Note that, when utilizing the advertisements you should engage as in Activity 2 with defining unfamiliar words and/or preview words/phrases. Not all unfamiliar words will be included in the larger Vocabulary & Key Term as they often only appear once in the text and are generally  infrequently utilized words and terms from the 18th-century.

Activities/Primary Sources: Creating a Memorial