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• 1 2016-04-10T16:16:14-07:00 Annual Celebration 3 revpar 2016-04-10T16:20:28-07:00

  Gordon Parks’ Fort Scott

  The small city of Fort Scott, Kansas reveals yet another example of the complex history of United States Civil Rights. Prior to the Civil War, Kansas declared itself a free state, welcoming 60,000 African-Americans fleeing slavery in the south and southern Missouri between the years 1875-1881. In 1896, the Supreme Court ruling the in case of Plessey vs. Fergusson allowed individual states to reject or accept segregation laws. Kansas, despite its initial acceptance of former slaves, was no longer a place of refuge for African-Americans. Under state law, it was justifiable to require and provide separate public facilities, deny services, or prevent the sale or renting of homes to African-Americans.[1] Born in 1912 to Sarah and Jackson Parks, in the small city of Fort Scott, Kansas Gordon Parks was no stranger to the racism and discrimination that existed throughout his home state.

  As a child, Parks was required to attend an all-black school until ninth grade and was denied the ability to play on sports teams or in parks with white children. Gordon, like everyone else that looked like him, received health care from the city’s one African-American doctor, who if needed to, was not allowed to perform any major surgery. Parks was discouraged by his white school counselor to plan for college, and witnessed police brutality against innocent friends. After the passing of his mother in 1927, fifteen year-old Gordon was sent to live with one if his older sisters in St. Paul, MN.[2] Parks did not return to his boyhood home until 1948 when he was hired full time by Life Magazine and assigned a story that focused on segregation In America’s education systems. Parks found and photographed the lives of his former classmates from the Second Plaza, more popularly known as the Hawking’s’ School (fig.1).[3]

   Shortly after his trip to the Midwest, Parks wrote his first novel, The Learning Tree after accepting an offer from to write a novel based off his boyhood experiences in Kansas. The semi-autobiographical work blends fiction and reality as Newt, the novels’ protagonist, interacts with non-fictional characters such as bigoted Sheriff Kirky and narrow-minded Miss McClintock . In 1965, Parks directed the film version of the novel, becoming the first African-American to create a Hollywood film. When Parks made the decision to film several scenes in Fort Scott, the city reacted with mixed feelings as many feared Parks’ negative childhood memories would have too large of an impact on the film creating a bad reputation for the residents. Despite the reservations of some, others welcomed Parks with hopes his fame would help revive their dying city. Unfortunately, Fort Scott did not experience a great revival, and to this day remains an impoverished area.

  Since opening its doors in 2004, The Gordon Parks Museum/ Center for Culture and Diversity at Fort Scott Community College hosts an annual celebration with scheduled events such as poetry and photography contests for school children, guided tours of Fort Scott, and discussions emphasizing the museum’s commitment to not only preserve the work and legacy of Gordon Parks, but to use Parks’ life story “to teach about artistic creativity, cultural awareness, and the role of diversity in our lives”.[4] In its early years, the celebration, and the physical space of the museum functioned as a place of reunion for friends and family connected through both Gordon Parks and the City of Fort Scott; a place where they could share stories and experiences that gave a different kind life to Parks’ work.[5] After visiting Fort Scott during the actual celebration, it is now clear to me that it is impossible to separate Gordon Parks from the American Civil Rights Movement. It is impossible to tell the story of Gordon Parks without the stories of the black community.

   

  Hug the Woman Who Hugged the Man

  I was invited to attend the Annual celebration as part of the Gordon Parks Archive Project at Kansas State along with Daniel, another intern and Dr. Katy Karlin by Jill, director of the Gordon Parks Museum/ Center for Culture and Diversity. Katy, Daniel and I arrived at the celebration on Friday just after lunch with enough time to set up for Katy’s discussion, Digitizing the Learning Tree. She explained the progress and goals of the project, noting the significant contributions from Jill, the museum’s director (Fig. 2). After Katy’s presentation ended, Gordon’s niece Robin was the first to speak during the question and answer period. Robin has a very distinct voice; one that is far from timid and commands attention. She, like many members of the Parks family, has a way with words. Later, Robin inquired about my heritage; I hesitated then told her I was an American. She said that was fine, but stated that I also looked Mexican. I informed her guess was correct, my mother’s father was born in Mexico. Robin hugged me said that Uncle Gordon would be very happy to see Daniel and I; it meant “things were getting better”.

  Shortly after meeting Robin, I joined Katy and Daniel for a drive by Tour of Gordon Park’s Fort Scott. The tour included stops that were not only significant to Parks such as his family’s old house, but also the black community such as Hawkins School. Anne, a Fort Scott native, provided historical and personal stories of each stop (Fig. 3). Anne was born in Fort Scott, and similarly to Gordon, she attended the Hawkins School before entering an integrated high school. The school was named in honor of its Principle, Professor Ernest J. Hawkins who devoted sixty-five years to providing a quality education for African Americans (Fig. 4). Anne spoke very fondly of her education at the Plaza School, expressing that she did not feel behind once she entered high school, which was integrated. At Liberty Theater, she revealed that during the time Gordon Parks lived in Fort Scott, blacks were only allowed to sit in the back row or on the balcony. The theater was also the location of the first celebration’s formal dinner, where Gordon Parks was welcomed by the governor of Kansas to the front row (fig. 5).

  Eloise, who is slightly younger than Anne, had her own set of stories to share throughout the tour. When we stopped at what used to be the designated park for African-Americans during segregation, she informed me that there was a photograph on one of the timelines back at the museum of her grandmother and her girlfriend sitting on the edge of the pool (fig. 6). Additionally, Eloise insisted that even after segregation ended, “old Black Park” was where the African-American community would host cookouts, parties, and family reunions under the large pavilions. Today, the park is abandoned; all that remains is an empty field and three picnic tables in poor shape. With public places such as the park no longer in existence, other spaces such as the Gordon Parks Center take over allowing for familial gatherings.

  On the final day of the celebration, a tribute luncheon was held in honor Gordon’s eldest daughter Toni Parks-Parsons who died on August 24, 2015. Since Toni lived in London prior to her death, the celebration was the first time many members of the Park’s family were in the same space. Members of the Parks family gave short speeches about Toni including her brother David and sister Leslie, as well as her son Alain and best friend Julie. David’s words were poetic. Through his tears, David admitted that he did not cry when his brother died, nor did he cry after his father passed in 2006. Thinking of Toni, he said, “but women, women are a different breed of cat.” David also announced his decision to be buried in Evergreen Cemetery alongside his grandparents, father, and brother, Gordon Jr. Alain, also broke down. Jill initially tried to stop all cameras from recording him, but Alain was not concerned about people seeing him cry. In fact, he said “I don’t care, if you don’t cry at least once a day, you’re not human” (Fig.7 and Fig. 8).

  Though my time in Fort Scott was very brief, I left feeling as though I had connected with people on a deeper level than people I have known for many years. At the celebration, I thanked everyone I met for sharing their stories with me. Without Jill or the Gordon Parks Center, those connections would not have been formed. The celebration not only gave me a better understanding of who Gordon Parks was as an artist, but who he was as a human. I was moved by my interactions with the people I met and left with the understanding that this would not be my final trip to Fort Scott, nor would it be my last interaction with the individuals I met. As Alain said as we were parting ways, “we are going to be friends for life”.

   

  The 21^st Century Museum

  Contemporary museums, like any other public service institution, maintain a complex relationship with its community. As early as 1841, museum founders such as P. T Barnum recognized that museum success is reliant upon a degree of interaction between the visitor and exhibition, thus leading to his desire to create a memorable experience pairing objects on display with the false information. Barnum hoped that visitors would notice the false information and engage in conversation with one another about the exhibit. In 1969, an exhibition titled Harlem on My Mind opened at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The exhibit criticized, regarded by the public as too extreme. The exhibition was not only curated by a white male who exoticized the African American Community, it incorporated display techniques vastly different than any other contemporary MET exhibition; it did not connect to the rest of the museum. Additionally, the exhibited opened too soon after the heat of the civil rights movement that dominated the 1960’s. The public was not yet ready to talk about race.[6] Though the museum was unsuccessful in achieving its goal of facilitating conversation about race between museumgoers, the exhibit it displays a focus of contemporary museums, to provide a designated space for discussing difficult topics such as racism as a service to their public.

  Additionally, contemporary American museums provide a public service by monumentalizing important spaces within its community. Monuments, according to Owen Dwyer and Derek Alderman, allow for remembrance of a particular event by providing a permanent physical structure unlike other methods commemoration such as national holidays. Street names, for example, have become the most common method of commemorating the late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. throughout the South.[7]Similarly to the changing of street names, contemporary museums such as the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, Tennessee reclaim a specific location to commemorating it as a place of reunion and gathering. The National Civil Rights Museum is built around what was once the Lorraine Motel—the exact location where Dr. King was assassinated on April 4, 1968 (Fig. 9). Inside the appropriated hotel, walk through and witness King’s final hours on earth as the exhibit is maintained to appear as it did during the reverend and civil rights leader’s stay, monumentalizing his final moments. In Fort Scott, though African American families are unable to host family reunions or gatherings at what was once their community park, they are able to meet at the Gordon Parks Museum/Center for Culture and Diversity. Unlike the National Civil Rights Museum that reclaims a physical space, The Gordon Parks Center reclaims spaces in history by assuming their role of a designated place for gathering and reunion.

   Carol Duncan argues that, though secular spaces, museums often function as “ceremonial monuments”, sites were society physically represents its beliefs and history; “not just a container of things”.[8] Similarly to Ancient temples, museums exist within their communities to fulfill the role of providing designated ritual space. Duncan’s approach to considering the museum space as a center for the ritual of learning and contemplation is connected to a history of scholarship within the social sciences, notably an anthropological lens. Randall Collins finds that this approach often overlooks ritual activity on a more day-to-day communication and interaction with other humans.

  Collins, finds secular rituals to be mechanisms “of mutually focused emotion and attention that together, produce a momentarily shared reality which generates solidarity and symbols of group reality”.[9] Through this lens, the ritual practice that exists within the museum space is neither the interaction with object, nor is it learning and contemplation; it is the situational experience of emotional group discussion communication.  Conversation is not limited strictly to verbal discussion. Instead, varying methods of communication such as smiling, acknowledging a familiar faces reveal different types of personal relationships within a group. At the Gordon Parks Celebration, for example we began to have more personal interactions and more emotional conversations with members of the Parks family and the Fort Scott, ultimately resulting in contact with each other outside of museum and celebration space.  Group interaction within a confined space creates an energy that produces a shared focus of attention in group settings, Collin argues that verbal conversation is the most effective social interaction to effect emotion. “Talk creates for the participants a world and reality that has other participants in it”, which result in shared emotions, that when engaged more than once, act to intensify “collective moments of the same intersubjectivity”.  During my time in Fort Scott, I encountered the same individuals on multiple occasions. Brief encounters as well as extended conversations added up over the course of the weekend, strengthening the connectedness between individuals in attendance (Figure 9).

   Conversation and dialogue within the museum space, like any ritual, requires participation, in order to create a sense of solidarity or collective identity. Victor Turner’s theory of liminality, suggests that rituals such as discussion, can result in a reality “betwixt-and –between the normal, day-to-day cultural and social states”.[10] The ritual of group discussion within the confined space of the museum, and resulting emotional energy create a liminal reality where the museum visitor/ participants are temporarily removed from their individual identities, existing within a shared group identity to perpetuate the solidarity and discussion of the group. This perhaps explains why Edwin Mason’s presentation Gordon Parks and the American Dream, was recorded to have the longest question and answer session.[11] Mason’s discussion benefited from being the not only the final scheduled talk of the weekend, but also only a brief fifteen minutes after the conclusion of the tribute luncheon to Toni. The individuals created an emotional energy allowing for a shared attention. In this instance, Gordon Parks becomes the symbol which serves as a representation of the group solidarity, a uniting force and face to their collective identity (fig. 10)

              The annual celebration at the Gordon Parks Center in Fort Scott highlights the importance of human interaction within museum space and offers a starting point in examining the museum’s success. Contemporary museums such as the Gordon Parks maintain complex, yet mutually beneficial relationship with its community functioning as a dialogic meeting space. The museum benefits the community by monumentalizing important cultural spaces and providing   designated spaces for communal gathering. Through these interactions, the museum’s impact on its visitors is able to expand beyond its physical space, affecting its visitors on first an emotional then social level.

  
  

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  [1]Cassel Eick, Gretchen. Dissent in Wichita: The Civil Rights Movement in the Midwest, 1954-72. (Chicago:: University of Illinois Press, 2001), 291

  [2]Gordon Parks, Half Past Autumn: The Life and Works of Gordon Parks, DVD, directed by Craig Laurence Rice (2001)

  [3]These photographs and accompanying text were never published in Life. Karen Haas, curator of the Lane Collection of Photography at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, has tracked down the photos and presented them in the exhibit Back to Fort Scott.

  [4]Gordon Parks Museum/Center for Culture and Diversity website

  [5]Ibid,.

  [6]Kathleen McLean, “Museum Exhibitions and the Dynamics of Dialouge,”in Reinventing the Museum: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives on the Paradigm Shift, ed Gail Anderson (Walnut Creek: AltaMira, Press), 199-200.

  [7]Owen J. Dwyer and Derek H, Alderman, Civil Rights and Geography of Memory (Chicago: Center for American Places at Columbia College Chicago, 2008), 8-11.

  [8]Carol Duncan, “The Art Museum as Ritual” The Art Bulletin, (March 1995) 7-10

   

  [9]Randall Collins, Interaction Ritual Change (NJ: Princeton University Press, 2004) 7-8.

  [10]Victor Turner, “Liminality and Communitas” in The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure ( Chicago: Aldine Publishing ,1969) 97.

  [11]Information provided after the celebration by Jill Warford