In recent years, the Great Dismal Swamp has drawn increasingly public attention for its role in sheltering self-emancipated enslaved peoples prior to the Civil War.
Called “maroons,” African Americans opted for the perils of life in the swamp rather than endure the violence of enslavement. Current commemorative activities, like Cornland School Museum and Historical Village in Chesapeake, the interpretive pavilion in Suffolk, and the National Heritage Area feasibility study, help to tell stories of Black and Nansemond life in and around the swamp.
In this presentation, public historian Perri Meldon explores what became of the Great Dismal Swamp after 1865. What decisions did Black, white, and Native farmers, landowners, hunters, and lumbermen make that shaped the vitality of this wetland? When so many other southern swamps were drained, cultivated, and built upon in the twentieth century, how is it that the Great Dismal Swamp has remained such a prominent ecosystem in southeastern Virginia? Meldon invites attendees to reflect on the cultural and environmental stories of this place, past, present, and future.
This event is free and open to the public. Advance registration required. The venue is ADA accessible.
About the Fellow
Perri Meldon is completing her PhD at Boston University, and she held a 2023-2024 Public Humanities Fellowship at Virginia Humanities. She also serves as national coordinator of the National Park Service Mellon Humanities Postdoctoral Fellowship Program. Perri lives in the Shenandoah Valley.
