Thank you letter - Penland

 When I received the scholarship to take the Linocut Wallpaper class on the Letterpress, I wept. This past year and a half has been incredibly difficult—my career collapsed, and I found myself at a crossroads, needing to completely reinvent my life. Surface design had become a new devotion, and I felt a deep calling to explore whether I could build a new life within this creative field.

This particular class in wallpaper printing felt like a rare gem—something aligned so perfectly with what I longed to learn. Receiving a scholarship to attend, along with room and board, was a profound affirmation during a time of deep depression. I took it as a sign from the universe that I was on the right path.

Now, as the class winds down, I am just as grateful as I was when I first opened the scholarship email. Laura Baisden is an incredibly passionate teacher, and her TA, Elizabeth—herself a wallpaper professional—is equally knowledgeable, creative, and caring.

I write with immense gratitude for the opportunity to take this extraordinary class, to be nourished with beautiful food, to practice yoga, and to work in such a well-equipped print shop. Penland is, for me, a place of deep creativity and mindful care. This experience has been both transformative and affirming.

I hope Penland continues to be part of my journey. Thank you from the depths of my heart. “Thank you” feels far too small for the magnitude of what I feel.

Key West Cemetery

I'm looking for the Black Areas of the Key West Cemetery.  I don't really know how to navigate it or what I'm looking at. Dumps, a graveyard boy said he'd walk me through it next time I'm there.

There's this Jewish Section but it's more modern.

I think these are the condominiums that "Dumps" was mentioning that african americans are buried in.

Fort Taylor (built by enslaved africans (but noone wants to talk about it) - Key West

It was built by enslaved people of African descent but there was no mentioned of that on the 75 minute tour I took.

"It is not uncommon for Key West to deny past racism by reciting the claim that Key West was part of the Union during the Civil War. While it is true that Union forces took control of Fort Zachary Taylor and Fort Jefferson, the allegiance of Key West’s citizens at the time is debatable.

The fact that slaves, owned by prominent citizens of Key West who leased them to engineers of the U.S. Government for personal profit, built Fort Zachary Taylor and Fort Jefferson is not debatable." 

https://keysweekly.com/42/slavery-at-fort-taylor-fort-jefferson/ 

Key West’s slavery and emancipation story is quite different from those of other parts of Florida or the U.S. From the first American settlement in 1822, slavery was a part of Florida Keys culture, and by 1860, of 2,913 people at Key West, 451 of them were enslaved.[1] But, as the islands were too small to support large-scale agriculture, the Florida Keys never developed a plantation economy. Instead, the enslaved were often forced to work as domestic servants or as workers in the salt manufacturing business. But surprisingly, the largest single employer of slave labor in the Keys was the U.S. government, which utilized forced labor in the construction of Fort Taylor on Key West and Fort Jefferson at the Dry Tortugas.[2] For many years, Key West slaveowners rented their people to the Army Corps of Engineers to help build the large masonry structures.

https://www.keyslibraries.org/post/island-chronicles-vol-8 

Henrietta Marie - Bell

Working on a design from the bell from the ship used in the transatlantic slave trade named the Henrietta Marie that sunk off of Key West. 

Michael Cottman wrote, "This bell would be the clue that would lead researchers to a horrible past of pain and unconscionable acts inflicted on men, women, and children in unprecedented numbers. These crimes were so brutal that strong men, their chests tight from fear, would prefer to jump over the sides of slave ships to a certain death rather than endure another day on board."