American Antiquarian Society | “Herald of Freedom: Perspectives from the Collection”

On January 18 at 4:00 p.m., the American Antiquarian Society (AAS) in Worcester, Massachusetts presented “Herald of Freedom: Perspectives from the Collection” via Zoom. The program centered around the rediscovery of two editions of Peter Humphries Clark’s paper Herald of Freedom, an abolitionist newspaper owned by an African American socialist, within the society’s collection back in June 2022. Since then, the newspapers have been digitized and are on display through the AAS website. Embedded below is the issue from June 2, 1855 (Volume 1, Number 1).

The talk began with a video from by Vincent Golden, the newspaper and periodicals curator at AAS, who described the discovery of the newspapers. Golden explained how libraries have backlogs of unprocessed material and are often not sure exists in the collection. He was searching through a backlog from before 2002 and found two issues of the rare newspaper.

Research led Golden to the biography America’s First Black Socialist: The Radical Life of Peter H. Clark written by Dr. Nikki Taylor, chair of History Department at Howard University. At the time of publication in 2012, no copies of the newspaper were believed to survive. During the live presentation, Dr. Taylor discussed her book on the life of Clark, noting how he supported public education and political empowerment for African-Americans. Born free in 1829 in Cincinnati, Ohio, Clark became an anti-slavery lecturer, the first Black principal in the Ohio school system, and assistant newspaper editor to Frederick Douglass. Dr. Taylor believes Clark was not well-remembered in history because he did not neatly fit into a single ideological category. In addition to his support of socialism and abolition, Clark drew inspiration from German freethinkers, enlightenment rationalism, and African-American traditions.

Up next was Dr. Derrick R. Spires, an award winning writer and a professor at Cornell, who described the contents of the newspaper and its context within Ohio and American society at the time of its printing. The introduction in the first section of the newspaper proved Clark’s knowledge on the history of radical publications in the United States. He began with a quote from the 1794 book The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine, “The most formidable weapon against errors of every kind is REASON”. Next, Clark acknowledged that many Black newspapers in Ohio had been founded only to fold, although internationally recognized publishers like Frederick Douglass and Mary Ann Shadd found success with their newspapers. Clark also argued against the belief held by abolitionist Horace Greeley of the New York Tribune that Black writers did not have enough intellect to make their own newspaper. In fact, there was no want of original content in the surviving issues. The newspaper included poetry and serialized fiction, along with minutes from the National Council of the Colored People. The inclusion of these minutes was important for the Black community, as a huge number of conventions were held in the United States every week, with Black conventions relegated to later pages in white-run newspapers if they were published at all.

Every speaker during this presentation was excellent, but my favorite section was led by Eclair Morton, conservation intern at AAS during the summer of 2022 and an MA/MS candidate in art conservation at SUNY. Morton demonstrated the techniques and materials for conserving newspapers in a lab using a copy of the New Orleans Tribune, which experienced cycles of humidification. She used a soot sponge — a sponge used for cosmetics with no additives — to gently remove surface dirt from the paper, noting that some papers like linen rag are more forgiving than others papers like newsprint. She also used “parmesan cheese”, actually eraser crumbs massaged across the surface of the paper. Additionally, Morton carefully bathed a newspaper in deionized water to rinse out degradation products and take away the yellow color. Alkaline was added to the water to deacidify the paper and prevent further acidification. The paper needed to go through multiple baths before it was clean. Once the papers were clean, Morton used different types of tissues for mending. Light tissues were handmade in Japan using long and strong fibers from mulberry trees, which created a thin, cobweb-like paper to sit atop printed text with the original newsprint visible underneath. Areas without text or missing paper were reinforced with a thicker tissue.

After each speaker had presented, a Q&A was moderated by Dr. Nan Wolverton, Vice President of Programs and director Center for Historic American Visual Culture (CHAViC) at AAS. Attendees learned that The Herald of Freedom failed after four or five months, despite Clark’s bold statements in the first issue. The failure was more due to financial trouble than lack of importance, as excerpts from the newspaper were reprinted in other papers. To support the paper, Clark ran advertisements from wholesale manufacturers of textiles, dressmakers, groceries stores, and more. He asked people to donate to support the paper, not ing that James Ball and Levi Coffin could be trusted to take in the funds. Clark traveled widely to attend conventions and had contacts around the United States who likely received and supported his paper. Many of his connections lived in St. Louis, Missouri, home to another vibrant Black community. With Clark’s travels in mind, both Dr. Taylor and Dr. Spires emphasized the importance of having a newspaper in Ohio, as Clark wanted to reflect the experience of Black Ohioans on the national stage. Ohio never legalized slavery, was among the first states to have a convention movement, and was home to a large, well-educated, politically astute, free Black community that sent their children to private schools.

Lauren B. Hewes, Vice President of Collections and curator of graphic arts, spoke near the end of the Q&A session to explain improvements to library systems. The backlog where the newspapers were discovered by Vince had likely once been housed on the third or fourth floor of the second building of the AAS, as this area was heated by coal before 1912, giving all the documents a greasy feel. At the time the newspapers came into the collection, the library did not have a good documentation system, and Google was probably a hundred years away, so the papers have no acquisition file.

This presentation was among the most fascinating and best organized that I have watched, with a seamless flow between the recorded video, book overview, analysis of a historic document, live conversation, and Q&A  session. All presenters were truly the experts in their field along with a strong presence on camera. I highly recommend anyone interested in history and conservation to watch the talk once it is posted to the AAS YouTube channel.