Story behind the Photo: Elizabeth Keckley— First Black Woman in the White House

On Sept. 27, I posted the story of Elizabeth Keckley, who was born a mixed-race slave in 1818 in a Virginia. (Her father was the owner of herself and her mother). She went on to be raped by a white man and have a son who was 3/4 white, buy her own and her son’s freedom through her sewing skills, move to Washington D.C. to become the leading society dressmaker, and she made the inauguration gown and every subsequent dress of the new First Lady, Mary Todd Lincoln.

She became the only one who could calm Mrs. Lincoln before a party, dressed her,and chose her accessories. Ultimately Elizabeth became her close friend and companion. After the president’s assassination, Keckley was the first person Mrs. Lincoln asked for. When the widow moved back to Chicago, they had a long correspondence and ultimately Elizabeth Keckley, who had founded several philanthropies to helped former slaves, wrote a book called “Behind the Scenes Or, Thirty Years a Slave and Four Years in the White House.”

This caused such a scandal that Elizabeth Keckley was abandoned by her white customers, and, despite working as a professor of “Sewing and Domestic Science Arts” at Wilberforce University into her 80’s, she died at the age of 89 in the National Home for Destitute Colored Women and Children, which she had helped establish. Her son, who passed as white in order to serve in the Union Army, was killed in action in 1861.

I had never heard of this remarkable woman when I bought a 1/6 plate ruby glass ambrotype in a gold-embellished thermoplastic case from a seller on E-Bay in 2007. He evidently had never heard of her either, because he added later in the auction: “I have had several e-mails with the observation that a person with the name “Elizabeth Keckley” was a 19th century American author and could have had some connection with the Federal government and White House during the American Civil War.”

As he said in the original description, a paper note is pinned to the velvet lining of the cover with the words “Elizabeth Keckley, formerly a Slave”.

I collect antique photographs having to do with slavery and black Americana, so I bought this one, winning the auction with a price of $227.50. If the seller had mentioned a Lincoln connection the ambrotype, it would have gone for much more. I’ve seen a carte de visite photograph of Lincoln’s dog, Fido, go for several thousand dollars.

When I received the ambrotype and researched it, I was thrilled—mainly to learn about this extraordinary woman who achieved so much during the Civil War era. But I’m not at all sure that the mixed-race black woman in the ambrotype is really Elizabeth Keckley. (The seller may have refrained from mentioning Lincoln so he couldn’t be accused of misrepresenting the image, or he could just have been ill-informed.)

I am posting the only three published images of Elizabeth Keckley that I could find in the collage at the bottom--from youngest to oldest. “My” image, at the top, would be an even younger version of her, or it could be someone else entirely. There are similarities, certainly, including the earrings. The nice thermoplastic Union Case housing the image would have cost the sitter more than the common embossed leather cases. The woman in the ambrotype is richly and fashionably dressed and clearly mixed race. Is it Elizabeth Keckley?

What do you think? Let me know at joanpgage@yahoo.com

CRONE COMPLAINT: UGLY, LIFE-THREATENING SHOES

Those shoes at the very top are not a joke. I ran across the photo while browsing through “News Photos of the Week” on the internet recently and the caption read: “A model presents an outfit by British designer Alexander McQueen during ready-to-wear Spring and Summer 2010 fashion shows in Paris.”

I immediately knew that my first weekly Crone Complaint would be about shoes.

I like shoes as well as anyone, and I never want to be the crone in a sweat suit shuffling around the supermarket in battered sneakers. (Well, come to think of it, when I’m on my way to the gym that’s exactly what I am!) I think it was “Sex and the City” that turned shoe-shopping almost into a religion.

I’m 5’4” and have always longed to be taller, so since high school I’ve always wanted some height—at least an inch and a half heel—on my shoes, even walking shoes. Daughter Eleni is only 5 feet tall and she claims that, like Barbie, her feet are frozen in a tippy-toe position from permanently wearing heels. I’ve seen her climb a mountain in three-inch high espadrilles.

That said, I think all the shoe designs now coming into fashion are ugly, inconvenient and hazardous to our health. They should come with warning labels.

I’m not a fashionista, although I have written for Vogue. I page through fashion magazines at the hairdresser and was sort of aware a year ago that the shoes in the magazines were looking a lot like what was previously worn only by a dominatrix for S&M sessions. I think they’re called bondage shoes. Eleni questions the term. She says I’m referring to gladiator shoes.

(Late breaking bulletin—this is what I found on www.starfashionaddict.com “Bondage shoes are for all intents and purposes, a more serious or hard core version of the gladiator sandal. Gwyneth Paltrow has been seen running around town in them as well as Carrie Bradshaw in the “Sex and the City” movie. Over the past year, they have been popping up in stores everywhere, but many girls who love the edginess are still afraid to wear them.”)

Whatever they’re called, my first thought was “Ugly!” and my second was—“Imagine trying to take those off in the airport security line while everyone behind you fumes.”

A third thought: all shoes with lots of straps and buckles make your legs look shorter—even if you’re a six-foot-tall model—and don’t we all want longer-looking legs?

Now, with the current crop of ridiculously high and teetering stiletto heels being shown on the fashion runways for 2010, I can only imagine that orthopedic surgeons around the world will be buying new summer homes, thanks to all the broken bones they’ll be treating.

Broken hips and falls can be deadly, especially to older people, so no wonder my mother used to wear what she called her “ground gripper” shoes during the day. But she still would put on heels to go out. ( She also told me that no decent woman would ever wear red shoes. I have several pairs of red shoes in my closet but always feel my mother’s celestial disapproval when I wear them.)

Just looking at the shoes above makes my feet hurt and I can only feel sorry for the models who have to wear them on the fashion runway. These are serious, very pricey shoes from the following brands: Nina Ricci, Rodarte, John Galliano, Manolo Blahnik, Dior, Alexander Wang, John Galliano, Bogetta Veneta. Why am I not surprised that most of them have been designed by men… who won’t have to wear them?

Of course we crones don’t have to wear them and I’m sure we won’t—nor would I, personally, ever pay $500 to $1,000 for any shoes, no matter what they look like. But seeing shoes like this in the fashion magazines and on the runway is insidious. Subconsciously we will get used to shoes looking like this, and modified versions of these leg-breakers will drift down to the lower-priced lines that we shop in our neighborhood malls. And pretty soon, we’ll find ourselves thinking it’s possible to walk or drive a car in four-inch-high platforms. And it will be a big mistake. Remember the 1970’s and the mini-skirt!

(Is there something that annoys you, makes you feel patronized or insulted… or just a complaint you’d like to share with fellow crones? Tell me about it below or by writing to joanpgage@yahoo.com so I can feature it on Crone Complaint Tuesdays.)

Madeleine Albright and My Life in Junk Jewelry

(Okay, so I’ve missed my first self-imposed deadline! This was supposed to appear on the weekend. And instead of the “Crone Complaint” appearing on Monday, it will appear on Tuesdays. Hopefully by next week I’ll get the categories on the right weekdays!)

I recently learned about former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s new book “Read My Pins—Stories From a Diplomat’s Jewel Box”.

The description said: “Read My Pins is a story and celebration of how one woman’s jewelry collection was used to make diplomatic history. Exploring the use of the pin or brooch as a means of personal and diplomatic expression …(it] offers a whole new side of Secretary Albright.”

The New Yorker mentioned that, when diplomatic negotiations stalled, Albright might wear a jeweled turtle, or a contentious encounter would inspire a rhinestone bee or a crab pin. In Iraq she was called a serpent in the press, so she thought it was amusing to wear a snake pin “when we did Iraq things”.

I love that our distinguished Secretary of State did this, because I suspect that high-level male officials seldom signal their feelings, hopes and goals with their fashion choices, as women almost always do. (But I read that Bill Clinton would wear a special tie to signal Monica Lewinsky.)

So, inspired by Madeleine Albright, I pulled out a bureau drawer that has been collecting all sorts of costume jewelry over the past four decades. Even my brownie pin was in there, as well as some TWA plastic “junior crewmember” pins from the days when children would be taken into the cockpit to meet the pilots. (Nowadays you can’t even congregate near the cockpit door!)

I found my sorority and Phi Beta Kappa pins and the charm bracelet my parents gave me with charms for various high school accomplishments. The day after graduation I left on a student trip to Europe where I collected a silver charm in each city—silver beer stein, Arc de Triomphe, Tyrolean bell, etc.

I felt like an archaeologist digging through that drawer. I’ve never been much of a jewelry person, even though my husband has bought me beautiful pieces over the years, including a gold necklace with a Greek coin of Alexander the Great from 300 B.C. But wearing expensive pieces makes me nervous—I think I’m going to lose them—so the good jewelry usually lives in a bank safe deposit box.

My mother only wore silver—to go with her trademark silver hair. I have a number of deco-style pins of hers as well as a miniature silver spoon. In the 1930’s, when a bride chose a sterling flatware pattern, she would be given a matching pin. I opened a small jewel box of hers, lined with velvet, and found her gold thimble and a small ornate silver cigarette holder. The box still smelled like her—Arpege perfume and cigarette smoke—although she’s been gone for 25 years. And I found her hat pins-- long, lethal-looking, each topped with a pearl or semi-precious stone.

She and I both had birthdays in early February so we often gave each other our birth stone, amethyst. In one tiny box I found an ornate amethyst lavaliere with a note: “This was given to me by Joanie in August 1980—it is to be returned to her. Martha Paulson”.

I think you can tell that neither my mother nor I ever threw anything away—but unlike me, she had everything organized and labeled.

The most valuable jewelry my mother left me was a brooch of giant rhinestones made by Eisenberg. She wore it when she had her portrait painted, and I wear it whenever I need some serious 1940’s style glamour and bling.

I found a large sunburst necklace made of beads and seeds bought for a dollar through a bus window in Morocco in 1968 when I was still in my semi-hippie phase. There was a gold brooch of a sailing ship bought in Switzerland when my husband and I completed a book about Greek ship owners in 1975.

I found a little gold Aztec -looking figure of a man with a tiny emerald in his chest which my husband brought back from Colombia while researching the narcotics trade for The New York Times. He said that emeralds improve the changes of becoming pregnant. It worked. And during a long-ago memorial service for Nick’s mother Eleni in his mountainous village, he looked on the ground and found a small, perfectly heart- shaped stone. He had it set in gold with “My love always” engraved on the back. I think that’s my favorite piece.

Eighteen years ago a friend who has a birthday close to mine gave me a silver and turquoise pin of a wide-eyed man holding his arms up (“thinking ‘Oh My God, I’m fifty!’” she said.)

Because I collect hands, my children often give me hand jewelry-- from Greece, Israel, India, and places I can’t even remember.

I discovered a flamboyant beaded collar or ruff that I bought in Mexico and never had the nerve to wear. (I can’t carry off dramatic jewelry very well.) On a piece of string I discovered a smiling Toltec god’s head made of clay that was put around my neck by Indian children while we celebrated the spring solstice and the vanilla harvest among the pyramids of El Tajin, Veracruz, Mexico. As the pyramids came to life at night with colored lights, and the indigenous people sang and danced, it was like time-traveling back to an era long before the Spanish came.

I’m very big on good luck charms, figuring a little protection can’t hurt—so I’ve been known to wear my little orange figure of the Hindu god Ganesh and the Om symbol on the same chain as a Greek “evil eye” charm. And in my trip to India this year, I went crazy buying “tribal jewelry”—hammered silver cuffs and necklaces picturing the Hindu gods. Now I need the courage to wear those dramatic pieces out in public, as Madeleine Albright did every day when she was representing the American people.

My archeological dig into my costume jewelry has left me with two resolutions: I’m going to try to wear these souvenirs of my life more often. And when my daughters come home for Thanksgiving, I’m going to let the them choose which ones they want, while I can still remember the stories that go with each piece.

"A Rolling Crone" Will Post Daily (Sort Of)

I started this blog a year ago because I was taking a class at the Worcester Art Museum from computer guru and famous artist Andy Fish. It was called something like “Selling Your Art on Line,” and he insisted that every artist or author should have a blog to put their work out there and build public recognition. He also emphasized that the blog should be updated every day.

Daughter Eleni came up with the title “A Rolling Crone” which I loved. I felt that women my age were not adequately represented on blogs and I thought “A Rolling Crone” could provide a forum for intelligent women post-sixty who are interested in art, travel, photography, literature and issues pertinent to cronehood, rather than, say, the misadventures of Britney Spears and Jon & Kate plus Eight.

(Some of my friends strongly objected to the term "Crone”. So I wrote an essay, “What is a Crone, Anyway?”, on Sept. 17, which you can check in the archives to the right.)

I really liked having a way to publish my thoughts and photographs (and sometimes paintings) on the internet, but after 40-plus years as a journalist, I tend to write essays with a beginning, middle and end, between 750 and 1,000 words. So it’s very hard for me to write more than one essay a week, unless I stop doing everything else. Yet Andy said again, when I took a course this year, that I don’t need to post a polished essay every day—just something: a photo, a quotation, anything. (“Joanie’s used to getting paid by the word,” he quipped to the class. “Ask her what time it is and she’ll tell you how to build a clock.”)

He and several students in the class have organized their blogs into categories for each day of the week. This struck me as a good idea, because then people will know, if they’re particularly interested in art, for example, to check on Thursdays.

So I’m going to break the week into categories on “A Rolling Crone”—but, as my friend Susan suggested, I’m not going to start with seven posts a week. Let’s say five and see how it goes. And I can’t possibly do this unless I get input from you. If you don’t want to post an opinion below, e-mail me at joanpgage@yahoo.com with complaints, favorites things, opinions, suggestions: anything in these categories:

Monday: Crone Complaints. I don’t want to sound like those people who turn into curmudgeons as they age, but there are some things that I find annoying or maddening or out-of-control lately. I think that as old, wise women, we have a right to complain now and then. My first Crone Complaint on Monday will have the title “SHOES”.

Wednesday: The Story behind the Photograph. On Oct 2 I told the story behind the civil-war-era photo of a slave with a scarred back—an image that was widely circulated by abolitionists. I also wrote a letter about it that was published in the New York Times Book Review on Oct. 4.

Because I collect antique photographs, I’ve learned many fascinating (to me) bits of history from researching the images in my collection. Like every collector, I dearly love some of the prize pieces in my collection and want to share them.

Thursday: The Artful Crone. I will try to feature a work of art every Thursday with as few words as possible. It may be a work by me, or a favorite artist, or a friend, or a folk artist (or it may just be a mural or graffiti on the street that I saw and liked.)

Friday: Crones’ Picks—citing a book, film or TV show that I like or you like and think other crones would enjoy. This category really needs input from you because lately the only time I have for recreational reading is on a plane. (I try to watch an hour of TV every night while on my stationary bike, but there are very few TV shows I’d recommend right now.) Films… I haven’t seen one I really liked since “Slumdog Millionaire”, although I thought “The Informant!” with Matt Damon was really well acted by the whole cast.

Weekend Essay. Don’t know what to call this yet—I was thinking Sunday Sermon but then no one would read it, thinking it’s about religion. Every weekend, I’m going to try to post an essay about whatever I feel like discussing. Tomorrow it’s “My Life in Junk Jewelry” inspired by the book Madeleine Albright just published: “Read My Pins” telling how, during her time as Secretary of State, she used the pins she collected and wore every day to signal her feelings and goals in her diplomatic interactions.

The following weekend, October 25, I’m going to write a post called “Do You Believe in Ghosts? Do I?” Many years ago, while writing a monthly column for “Country Living” Magazine, I asked for and received 100 letters from readers describing their experiences with hauntings. It turned into a controversial article which the editors told me to soft-pedal , but I’ve saved the letters because they’re full of fascinating detail.

So I hope you’ll help me with feedback and suggestions as I try to make “A Rolling Crone” turn up with a new post [almost] daily.

(If you’d like a free “crone power" bookmark, shown above, send me your address and I’ll mail you one-- or several. www.joanpgage.com.)

What I Learned at My Reunion

I’m back from three days at my 50th high school reunion in Edina, Minnesota and it was amazingly fun and moving and left me very proud of my class—especially those who defied illness or injury to show up. Friday night was cocktails and catching up at the Westin Edina hotel, where, during a trivia game, we all showed an uncanny ability to remember the dumb lyrics to those silly rock 'n' roll records of the late fifties.

At first I walked into a room full of tall strangers silhouetted against the windows and recognized no one. (All the guys had white hair and almost none of the women did.) Then I was met with hugs and shouts, and people started to turn into their remembered selves. Someone quoted a friend who had just come from her fortieth reunion: “For the first fifteen minutes, I was depressed at seeing all these old people, and then for the next three days, I was 18 years old again.”

Saturday morning was a bus tour of Edina, which looks nothing at all like the village I remember, where we would play kick-the-can until after dark down by Minnehaha Creek while our parents, busy barbecuing in the backyard, had no idea where we were and what we were doing. Now it’s all very high-end malls and high-rise buildings. The bus took us into Minneapolis proper and we toured the amazing architecture of the Guthrie Theater. I realized that Minneapolis is a very culturally happening place.

At Saturday lunch I gathered with classmates who had also gone to Wooddale Grade School. As we chatted, I began to realize that the men in the group had somehow, over the years, become charming, witty, entertaining, introspective, intuitive, chivalrous and thoughtful. All weekend, to my astonishment, chairs were pulled out and doors were opened for the “weaker sex” and someone always offered to help me struggle into my winter coat. (We had snow and the weather was bitter. On Sunday I left before a storm dropped three more inches. This is Minnesota, folks. No wimpy winters!)

Later I remarked to my daughter that, on the whole, my male classmates were amazingly improved over the last fifty years, and she replied, “Of course they are! What’s worse than an 18-year-old boy?”

Saturday night was the big dinner and dance at the Interlachen Country Club. I got a chance to catch up with some friends who had stayed in touch, but found the noise level and crowding to be intimidating. I’m always a bit claustrophobic and it was such a big and animated group that the hubbub made it hard to carry on a conversation. But the next day at breakfast in the hotel, there was time for some good post-party gossip before heading for the airport.

I believe there were 330 in our original senior class. Now 39 are deceased (the photos above show the memorial photo exhibit from Saturday night.) How young we were in 1959!

When you’re 18 years old, anything seems possible. Maybe you’ll cure cancer or write a bestseller or become a star or make a million—if only you can get into the right college.

When you’re 68, you know how your life will turn out, and for so many, that fifty years after graduation brought loss and heartbreak, illness and disabilities, but almost every one of the 187 classmates who wrote their biographical page for our Reunion Book ended with the words “I have been truly blessed” or a similar sentiment.

When you’re 68 years old, you’ve gained a certain amount of wisdom just by traveling over the bumps in the road. Many of my classmates shared some in their reunion book pages. I wish I could compile “The Collected Wisdom of the Class of 1959” but instead, I’ll just quote three classmates—as it happens all three are women (and now crones, since we’re all over 60.)

One wrote: “A rich life is one made up of family, friends, faith and fun – the four F’s.”

Another quoted Addison’s definition of happiness: “Something to do…something to love…Something to hope for.”

And a third concluded her page saying, “It amazes me how level the playing field is now. The very fact that we have survived 50 years post-high school makes us equals.”

MY 50TH HIGH SCHOOL REUNION!

(The design above, for the reunion invitation, was created by classmate Cary Carson.)


Tomorrow (Friday, Oct. 9) I get on a plane to fly from Boston to Minneapolis to attend the 50-year reunion of my class of 1959 at Edina Morningside High School. This is scary and exciting, nerve-wracking and exhilarating. It’s an event that many of us have been planning for more than a year. I was privileged to be one of the editors collecting bios and photos from 187 of our nearly 300 classmates for the Reunion Book. (Forty classmates are deceased and 22 of them have memorial pages in the book.)

High school was definitely NOT the happiest time of my life. I longed to get away from Edina, Minnesota, where we all seemed so homogeneous and competitive. Immediately after graduation, I traveled with a group of students to Europe for most of the summer and fell in love with travel—even though it was the ultra-budget variety. (The first hotel in Germany was a barely converted stable that still smelled like horses.)

At the reunion, I hope I’ll recognize my fellow classmates. The super-conscientious organizers of the event have created name tags for us—presumably with our high school yearbook photos—for ease of identification, but of course I’m too vain to wear my glasses so I probably won’t be able to read them! And I’m notoriously bad with names—can hardly remember those of my own children.

But I know from collecting the photos and bios that many of us have not changed that much in looks, despite the half century that’s gone by. What surprised and delighted me was how we’ve all traveled in different directions and survived a stunning variety of challenges.

As teenagers we all seemed pretty much alike. As 68-year-olds, there are plenty of classmates who describe lives filled with grandchildren, of course, and golf, tennis and going south for the winter. But who knew there would be so many senior citizens riding motorcycles, flying their own planes, women racing ATVs and jumping horses, painting portraits and writing books and deep-sea diving?

Some classmates described living on a boat or isolated in a lighthouse, raising their own grandchildren, writing movie scripts or poetry, serving in the CIA, surviving cancer, leading congregations, missions, Bible study groups and pilgrimages. One man who lost a leg as a youth founded a company making prosthetic limbs. A woman has spent years working with rescue dog rehabilitation in the treatment of veterans suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Another woman lived on a sailboat for 30 years, performs as a cabaret singer and has written books about a French poet and an Indian tribe in Panama.

Many of our classmates have suffered loss of a spouse through death or divorce and then found love late in life. And some are currently struggling with disability or disease, but still fighting to appear at this reunion.

In our adult lives, my generation has lived through the most momentous changes in history—the sexual revolution, the civil rights movement, political assassinations, Viet Nam, equal rights for women and the technological revolution. We basically invented teenagers and rock ‘n’ roll. Now we’re working out new ways to cope with old age.

I expect to learn a lot of fascinating and illuminating stories over this coming weekend, and when I get back from Minnesota, I’ll share what I’ve learned. This isn’t going to be our grandparents’ Fiftieth Reunion!

The Scarred Back of a Slave Named Gordon

On page 14 of Sept. 20’s Book Review, The New York Times published a shocking photograph of a slave with a horribly scarred back to illustrate a review of “Deliver Us from Evil”.

Because I collect antique photos and have many dealing with slavery and the life of black people in the 1800's, I wrote to the Times the back story behind this photo, and the letter, somewhat abbreviated, is in the book review section this Sunday--Oct. 4.

I wrote: This famous photograph, usually titled “The Scourged Back”, was widely circulated by abolitionists and is one of the earliest examples of photography used as propaganda. A contemporary newspaper, The New York Independent, commented: “This Card Photograph should be multiplied by the 100,000 and scattered over the states. It tells the story in a way that even Mrs. (Harriet Beecher) Stowe cannot approach, because it tells the story to the eye.”

As photo historian Kathleen Collins explained in The History of Photography Vol. 9 Number 1, January, 1985—it shows a slave named Gordon who escaped his master in Mississippi by rubbing himself with onions to throw off the bloodhounds. He took refuge with the Union Army at Baton Rouge and, in 1863, three engraved portraits of him were printed in Harper’s Weekly, showing the man “as he underwent the surgical examination previous to being mustered into the service—his back furrowed and scarred with the traces of a whipping administered on Christmas Day last.”

The actual photographs of the escaped slave, taken by McPherson and Oliver of New Orleans, were widely circulated as carte-de-visite photos. On the verso of the mount were the comments of S. K. Towle, Surgeon, 30th Regiment, Massachusetts Volunteers: “…Few sensation writers ever depicted worse punishments than this man must have received, though nothing in his appearance indicates any unusual viciousness—but on the contrary, he seems intelligent and well-behaved.”

I have a colored glass slide of the same photograph (above) in my collection, undoubtedly used in anti-slavery lectures. Abolitionists exploited the new medium of photography, circulating, in addition to "the Scourged Back", CDV’s of a slave named Wilson who was branded on the forehead, and selling thousands of the series of emancipated “white”-appearing slave children from New Orleans, posed patriotically, including wrapped in the American flag. On the back was printed: “The nett [sic] proceeds from the sale of these Photographs will be devoted to the education of colored people in the department of the Gulf now under the command of Maj. Gen. Banks.”

April 24, 2013--Because of questions I've received about this famous image, I am now adding below one of the original CDVs of Gordon's back showing him with his head tilted farther back to show his beard.  I do not own this image, but I've always been aware of it. I always assumed that both these poses of Gordon were taken at the same time, but when I study them together I don't know.  Another question--I always assumed that "my" image up at the top was  reversed--something that could easily happen with a glass negative.  (All daguerreotypes and ambrotypes are reversed mirror images of the actual subject, so if the subject is holding a newspaper, for example, the headlines will be reversed mirror-image writing.)  Now, looking at these two photos of Gordon together, I can't tell if the images show him turned to face opposite sides, or is one of them reversed and he's looking over his left shoulder in both of them?  Or do you think they were taken at two different photo sessions, separated by time?  Opinions?