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A Q&A about Tercentenary Markers with Jan Hardenbergh
1 — You recently participated in a panel discussion titled “The Signs Are All Around Us.” How did that experience and conversation influence your thinking, either as an individual or as Sudbury’s Town Historian, on the signs/roadside markers in Sudbury?
First let me clarify that the Town Historian is really a research position with no authority to speak for the Town of Sudbury.
My thinking of the 1930 markers changed because of the Massachusetts Seal at the top. It is a sword being held over the head of an indigenous man. In addition, it was made clear by the Nipmuc man, Andre Strongbearheart Gaines, Jr., that several of the signs depict the indigenous population in ways that are just wrong.
My feelings about the actual text on the 1930 markers have not changed. The markers describe three scenes of the English settlers defending themselves at the Sudbury Fight on April 21, 1676. While the signs are only portraying the point of view of white Americans in the 1930s, the veracity of the text on the markers is well documented. The most dubious statement on the signs is that the settlers “saved the town”. The Sudbury Fight was a military defeat for the English and many buildings around the town had been burned. Still, the garrison houses held.
I think everyone would agree that the signs need context.
2 — Context is critical when discussing history, but there’s a lot of context to share regarding this topic. What additional information might you cite for readers to further explore or understand the issues at play?
“First Peoples resided on this land for thousands of years before colonial settlers arrived, in the broader context, they can be understood to have been defending their ancestral land from invasion by colonial settlers.”
This is from a letter that some Members of the Sudbury Clergy Association wrote to the Sudbury Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Commission, which can be found in the link from the forum’s information page or you can view it in the meeting materials for the DEI meeting 2022-02-10.
There are dozens of books written about King Philip’s War. The points of view range from white supremacists to those that might be a bit strident about the evils of all of the settlers. When you read about some of the other battles and especially the treatment of the indigenous population in the aftermath of the war, much of it is shameful.
3 — While the event initiated an important conversation, what would you like to see happen as a next step?
The letter from the clergy got the ball rolling. It went to the DEI Commission and was discussed by the Historical Commission. Katina Fontes brought the discussion into the community.
What I would like to see happen next is for the signs to be modified to remove the current state seal and add context to the 1930 text. But there are several hurdles. The first is that the 1930 Markers are owned and maintained by the Massachusetts Department of Transportation, MassDOT. The second is that stakeholders would need to agree on what the new signs would say.
I think just removing the signs without replacing them would be a mistake.
For me personally, I would like to see the ongoing effort to change the Massachusetts Seal get done. That may take a couple of years. Once the state seal is changed, MassDOT might get funding to modify the signs.
4 — Local history can evoke strong feelings on a variety of topics. How do you approach the study of challenging or controversial history?
The markers controversy is the first controversy I’ve been involved with and it was fairly simple. There are two contexts and they seem to be contradictory, but, if you are able to embrace the complexity and the ambiguity of history, it works. An example that is tangential to local history is when Andre Strongbearheart pointed out the words in the Declaration of Independence that caught me by surprise: “merciless Indian Savages.“ The document is essentially two different texts. The preamble was a radical statement of human rights. The second was a list of complaints about King George. If we throw out the whole document, we lose a crucial bit of our history.
5 — Many residents note how they appreciate the history in Sudbury, but there always seems to be more to discover, like the history behind the roadside markers. Are there other less-explored facets of Sudbury history that you think need further research and/or deserve greater awareness?
The stories of the indigenous peoples before and after the arrival of the English need to be researched and properly told. Town Meeting will vote on a CPC article to fund an Indigenous Cultural Landscape Study. I hope we find more resources to help get the stories told.
Did you know there was a KKK riot in Sudbury? The aim was to suppress the Irish Catholic factory workers from the Saxonville mills.
How about the rich farmland we still call the “Great Meadows”? It was flooded by a dam in North Billerica that was created to control the flow of the Middlesex canal. After decades of legal wrangling, the court ordered that the dam be lowered to restore the meadows. Unfortunately, before the dam was lowered, the Civil War broke out and the canal was deemed essential.
Another story is about how Sudbury split into Sudbury and Wayland. So many people think that Sudbury was split out of Wayland. The truth is that the original town center is now a cemetery. When the West Side meetinghouse was built, the existing meetinghouse was moved to what is now the center of Wayland.