The Middle Road Project

The Middle Road Project The Middle Road Project examines how engagement with the presential election shows up in the America Photographing the American landscape

Current mood
02/09/2021

Current mood





October 19, 2020
01/20/2021

October 19, 2020



The Emancipation Oak- photographed October 24, 2020 The Emancipation Oak (Wikipedia) is a historic tree on the campu...
01/18/2021

The Emancipation Oak- photographed October 24, 2020





The Emancipation Oak (Wikipedia) is a historic tree on the campus of Hampton University in what is now the City of Hampton, Virginia. The large sprawling oak is 98 feet (30 m) in diameter, with branches which extend upward as well as laterally. It is designated one of the 10 Great Trees of the World by the National Geographic Society and is part of the National Historic Landmark district of Hampton University. The tree is a southern live oak (Quercus virginiana).

During the American Civil War (1861 to 1865), Fort Monroe became a place of refuge for African American people escaping slavery. The Union Army defined the people as contraband in order to provide them asylum. Virginia law had prohibited the education of enslaved people following the Nat Turner slave rebellion in 1831.

In November 1861, the American Missionary Association asked Mary Smith Peake (1823 to 1862) to teach children of freedmen at the contraband camp related to Fort Monroe. She was said to start her classes outside, under the tree. Peake was the first black teacher of the AMA, which expanded to support numerous educational institutions in the South. Her base was 3 miles from the protective safety of Fort Monroe, but her classes also attracted adults at night. Soon the AMA provided the Brown Cottage for her classes. She taught up to 50 children during the day and 20 adults at night.
In 1863, the Virginia Peninsula's black community gathered under the oak to hear the first Southern reading of President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, leading to its nickname as the Emancipation Oak.

13 flags behind the Statue of Liberty
01/13/2021

13 flags behind the Statue of Liberty



Break of dawn, Mississippi forest
01/13/2021

Break of dawn, Mississippi forest



Take a breath, 2020
01/13/2021

Take a breath, 2020



Adrian, October, 2020
01/09/2021

Adrian, October, 2020

Barrel of the flag
01/09/2021

Barrel of the flag



Billboard in Louisiana
01/08/2021

Billboard in Louisiana





In October 2020, I visited The Great Dismal Swamp seeking symbolism of the time. Today, I see this image conveying the m...
01/07/2021

In October 2020, I visited The Great Dismal Swamp seeking symbolism of the time. Today, I see this image conveying the murkiness and drowning feeling I have when watching the leadership vacuum and immense reflection of growth of American society, and of my role in it.





Via Wikipedia: Archaeological evidence suggests varying cultures of humans have inhabited the swamp for 13,000 years. In 1650, Algonquian-speaking Native Americans of coastal tribes lived in the swamp.

In 1763, George Washington visited the area, and he and others founded the Dismal Swamp Company in a venture to drain the swamp and clear it for settlement but the company later turned to the more profitable goal of timber harvesting.

Several African-American maroon societies lived in the Great Dismal Swamp during early American history. These Great Dismal Swamp maroons consisted of escaped black refugee slaves. Excavations reveal island communities existing until the Civil War.

America divided, torn
01/07/2021

America divided, torn

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