Members of the National Park Service removed signage around the President’s House historic site on Independence Mall on Thursday afternoon, in what appeared to be the fulfillment of an executive order from the White House meant to remove displays in America’s national parks that “disparage” the nation.
The signage was part of the exhibition “The President’s House: Freedom and Slavery in the Making of a New Nation,” which was unveiled in December 2010. It provided information about the nine enslaved people who then-president George Washington brought with him to the Philadelphia presidential residence and Washington’s ties to slavery.
Starting after 3 p.m., placards were ripped from the wall around the site with crowbars as people walked by, some heading to the Liberty Bell Center. Signs were unbolted from the poles overlooking the dig site where America’s first “White House” had stood until 1832. They were stacked together alongside a wall, and then taken away around 4:30 p.m. in a park service truck. No indication was provided where the signs and exhibition parts will go.
“It’s a damn shame,” said one onlooker who didn’t wish to be identified as he walked by. “All because of one man.”
Billy Penn reached out to both the National Park Service and the Department of the Interior by email Thursday, but neither had responded by the time this article was published.
Delaware County resident Juan Suarez had brought his family visiting from Colombia to see Independence National Historical Park and the exhibit on Thursday afternoon. He was surprised when he saw the signs being taken down.
“I’ve been living in Philadelphia for like 23 years, and I remember when it was first shocking to discover these quarters,” he said. “It’s history, you know. You can either run away from it or you can actually face it and just accept it and try to do better, but the fact that they are going to erase this, this is outrageous.”
‘Stay tuned’
The President’s House came under scrutiny after President Donald Trump signed an executive order in March, titled “restoring truth and sanity to American history.” It called for the removal from federal monuments, memorials and similar sites of displays that “contain descriptions, depictions, or other content that inappropriately disparage Americans past or living.” Instead, it said, those sites should showcase “the greatness of the achievements and progress of the American people or, with respect to natural features, the beauty, abundance, and grandeur of the American landscape.”
Signs were placed near those sites directing people to report any parts of historic sites that they felt didn’t align with the executive order’s message.
Avenging the Ancestors Coalition (ATAC), a group that had a key role in ensuring that the story of the enslaved people was recognized and had been protesting the impending move, called the removal “historically outrageous and blatantly racist.”
“But ATAC has been ready,” attorney Michael Coard, the founder for ATAC, wrote in a response for comment. “Stay tuned. We will announce our powerful action shortly.”
The Inquirer reports that Mayor Cherelle Parker’s office has responded to the signs’ removal by filing a lawsuit, claiming the federal government did not honor a 2006 cooperative agreement that may require advanced notice of changes to the site.
As of Thursday evening, information about the President’s House’s history and its ties to slavery remain available on the National Park Service’s website.
As the sun set Thursday, the only remnant of the exhibit was the etched names of the nine enslaved people on a wall near the entrance to the Liberty Bell. Suarez said that people will not simply forget the history behind the exhibition because the signs are gone.
“This display, it’s very moving,” he said. “It teaches all of us a really big lesson, that freedom is not free. That actually people had to fight and struggle and even go to war and give up their lives, so all of us could be here free. The fact that they are going to take this down so they could try to erase that part of history is sad, outrageous, shocking.”
