Hot as H--- in Philadelphia!

I have been without internet for nearly a week. How did we ever do anything back in the old days?

In the interim, I went to Philadelphia for a day. The temperature reached somewhere in the upper nineties and there I was, wandering around looking for the historic marker for the Philadelphia Female Antislavery Society. First, I had to ask an expert; and was fortunate enough to find one who knows at least two books worth of black history in Philadelphia. He pointed the way. Sadly, said expert was not an employee of a certain parks service visitors' center desk, nor was said expert's work familiar at the park service visitors' center desk...but I digress.

Also, in defense of certain parks service and their visitors' center desk, most people probably come up asking "where is the Liberty Bell?" not "where is the historic marker for the Philadelphia Female Antislavery Society."

Anyway, expert or not, one must remember the correct address, and consult notes when one does not, in order to actually find a place. I made the mistake of thinking that the address was 2nd and Arch streets, so I hiked and hiked and hiked, past Independence Hall, past the long long line for the Liberty Bell, past Ben Franklin's grave, further and further all the way to 2nd Street. Then, I walked up and down 2nd street. "Where?" I wondered, thinking that the heat had induced delusions and I was missing the rather large building that was supposed to stand on the site of the society. Then, I sang, "It's hot as HELLL in PhilaDELLphia."*

I also took out my map, where I had put a big blue dot on the address of the marker. FIFTH and Arch, dammit! FIFTH! All I can say in my own defense it that numbers were involved, and I don't do numbers.

Anyway, I turned around, and hiked all the way back to fifth and Arch. What do you know? There it was! The marker to the Philadelphia Female Antislavery Society!:

The marker stands in front of this building:Which is this:The mint (mmmm....mints!) is across the street from this:You probably can't tell from the image, but that is Benjamin Franklin's grave. Scroll back up a few paragraphs and look at the list of the things that I passed on the way to 2nd and Arch streets. Yes, I am that clueless.

The odd angle of this image is not any intentional artistry. The cemetery charges $2 admission. I'm cheap, so I just reached through the fence and took the picture.

Then, I needed some air conditioning, and perhaps some water. The Independence Mall is in the block across the street from Ben's bones and catty cornered to the Mint, so I drug my wilting body over. What is the first thing that you see when you walk in? Gift shop!

In the gift shop, there were, of course, more entries to the Online Museum of Historical Kitsch.
You can purchase a Ben Franklin Action figure, complete with kite (I'm rather amazed that there is not a marker somewhere that says "Near this site, Benjamin Franklin conducted his famous kite experiment.")

Or perhaps you prefer your Benjamins softer: The one on the left is a finger puppet. The one in the center is a bear Ben holding a Liberty Bell. Notice the key on the kite that the one on the right holds. Again, I think of 1776, the scene in which John Adams says that no one will remember him, they will just think that Benjamin Franklin struck the ground with his lightening rod and George Washington sprung forth, fully grown and on his horse. Then, the three of them -- Franklin, Washington, and the horse -- won Independence together. Except, in this gift shop scenario, just Ben won the war. Even George gets short shrift, probably because he owned slaves, and John is only mentioned to contrast his non-slaveowning with George's slaveowning.

After the Revolution, everyone (except George) installed a hidey-hole in their homes to help fugitive slaves. The End!

Seriously, that story is for the next post.

Meanwhile, when I started this post, I only intended to put up this picture because yesterday was the anniversary of Stonewall. I was stuck in the Independence Mall for quite a while because the clouds opened up. Then, heading back to the hotel, I passed this marker:

You seldom see any indication of GLBTQ people represented in public history sites, so this one was surprising. There it is, with Independence Hall in the background, showing that freedom was not won in the American Revolution, and that contradictions between freedom and the lack of it right there in the streets of Philadelphia are still central to the American experience.



*It's so wrong, so terribly wrong, but I do love that musical.