Topic: Labor
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Isaac Jefferson
This photograph shows Isaac Jefferson, a free blacksmith in Petersburg, Virginia, in 1847. Born at Monticello, he was one of ten Jefferson slaves who escaped with the British during the...
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Plan and Section of a Slave Ship
This image depicts the cramped and inhumane conditions existing on a British slave ship. Anti-slavery advocates publicized such images in order to generate public outrage and garner support for banning...
Lesson Plan
Does Slaveholding Tarnish Jefferson’s Legacy?
The impact of slaveholding on Jefferson’s legacyLesson Plan
Roles of African-Americans and their lives on Mulberry Row
To analyze primary resources, identify plantation duties and roles, and interpret a memoir of slave descendant.
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"London’s Virginia" Tobacco Label
Tobacco labels appeared on packages of tobacco or snuff. Within a decade of Virginia’s founding, tobacco was the colony’s major export. This label depicts white gentlemen relaxing in leisure while...
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A Cooper
This is an image of a cooper, a typical workman in early America. Coopers made a wide variety of wooden barrels or casks which could be filled with many different...
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A Map of the Parish of St. Stephen in Craven Country (Detail)
This detail from a map of South Carolina shows an indigo plant. Enslaved people cultivated the indigo plants which produced a valuable blue dye used in making paper, paints, and...
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An Overseer Doing His Duty
This image depicts a white overseer casually supervising the work of enslaved African women cultivating the tobacco crop in Virginia. Although some female slaves were assigned to do traditional women’s...
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Book of Trades
This image shows a hat-maker working at his trade. In the colonial era, Parliament prohibited Americans from making hats that would compete in the world market with English-made hats. After...
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