[PAST EVENT] "Prejudice so prevalent in the present generation:" Slavery at the College of William & Mary

March 1, 2011 - September 30, 2011
Location
Swem Library
400 Landrum Dr
Williamsburg, VA 23185Map this location
A new exhibit is now open in Swem
Library's Special Collections Research Center lobby called "Prejudice so prevalent in the present generation:" Slavery at the College of William & Mary. The exhibit was curated by Ben Bromley, Public Services Archives Specialist in the Special Collections Research Center. The exhibit runs through September 2011. Further press will follow in the coming weeks.

The history of slavery at the College of William & Mary is almost as old as the College itself. It is documented through College records, debates in the Virginia General Assembly, essays, letters of faculty and students, and even the College's oldest student newspaper, The Owl. William & Mary owned slaves on its plantation at Nottoway Quarter, leased land to farmers, had slaves cut wood and run errands into Williamsburg, and even let students bring their own slaves to campus (provided they paid a fee). During the Civil War, the College closed because faculty and students joined the Confederate Army. But the College of William & Mary was not unique; as judge and professor of Law St. George Tucker wrote, slavery was a "prejudice so prevalent in the present generation."