Today’s Flashback Photo shows Perry and Clara Anderson of Still Pond, circa 1940. This married couple’s daily journals have recently been digitally preserved as part of the Anderson Family Collection in the Chesapeake Heartland Project’s archive. The collection contains the daily journals of Perry and Clara Anderson, who were domestic workers and school administrators of the one-room African American school house in Still Pond, as well as images of the Andersons’ family, properties and livestock.
The journals span from the 1930s through 1956, and provide a personal look at the couple’s experiences as domestic workers for aristocratic white patrons and of the details of their daily lives. Included in the journal entries are observations on events and activities ranging from the global scale of World War II to notes on quotidian topics like the weather and the couple’s friends, family, and community.
Next Thursday, community historian Karen Somerville will lead a lunchtime discussion about the Andersons and their journals at 12 p.m. at the Historical Society. All are welcome. Image courtesy of the Starr Center for the Study of the American Experience at Washington College.
Barbara in den Bosch says
Wonderful! Yeah, Karen for doing this!