Note: Information found on this blog was written by Jennifer A. Ferretti unless otherwise noted. Please feel free to use the information found here so long as this blog along with the author are cited. Paul Henderson’s photographs belong to the Maryland Historical Society. Feel free to use digital images of Henderson’s work found here so long as the Maryland Historical Society and this blog as the retrieval point are cited.
As curator of an exhibition, it’s very difficult to narrow down the selection of items to place on display. While curating Paul Henderson: Baltimore’s Civil Rights Era in Photographs, ca. 1940-1960 at the Maryland Historical Society (MdHS), I realized that I would not only have to edit down the amount of photographs to exhibit but also to reduce the amount of text on exhibit labels. This blog serves as a limitless virtual white wall where other mediums such as video can be explored as well.
The videos were created using Henderson’s photographs and audio clips from the Governor Theodore McKeldin-Dr. Lillie May Carroll Jackson Oral History Project, held at MdHS. The oral history collection serves as an audio account of the Civil Rights movement in Maryland.
A series of posts called Who or Where? on this blog gives visitors an opportunity to identify unknown persons and/or places depicted in Henderson’s work. The Who or Where? slideshow posts also contain a link to the Henderson Collection Identification Survey, powered by Google Drive. If you think you can identify a person or place in a photograph, please fill out the Google Drive form. Please email jferretti@mdhs.org with any questions.
After the exhibition is deinstalled, this blog will continue to explore Henderson’s work.
Jennifer A. Ferretti, Curator
Former Curator of Photographs and Digitization Coordinator, Maryland Historical Society
Henderson Photographs Archivist
jenny.ferretti@gmail.com
The first print. Paul Henderson exhibition.
Home page video: Interview with Vernon Dobson. McKeldin-Jackson Oral History Project Collection, Maryland Historical Society, OH 8131.
Transcript:
I think it’s a false assumption that negro progress has been born on the shoulders of a few people.
And this is why I shun myself and [?] the leadership role, visible leadership role when it comes to being printed up in the press as a leader.
Because I think it’s a false assumption on the part of any person to believe that he or she is the leader.
We are participants of a process and the process is continuing. And it never ends. And isn’t going to end until everybody’s free.
PAUL HENDERSON 