Frederick Douglass Town Hall Activity

For our first speech activity, we had a fictional town hall meeting in which each student chose a historical figure to speak as. Each historical figure gave their takes on the issue of slavery, and whether they agreed or disagreed with the practice. I was John Brown, a puritan abolitionist who literally fought slavery in Bleeding Kansas. However, in this blog, I will instead discuss the pro-slavery figures that were at our town hall meeting. 

Dr. J Marion Sims

The first figure that interested me was Dr. J Marion Sims. Dr. Sims is known as "the father of gynecology", and was a pioneer in care for pregnant women (and women in general). He founded the first women's hospital in New York and was responsible for the opening of the nation's first hospital for cancer patients.

However, he had a dark side. Many of his techniques and discoveries were developed with the use of slaves as test subjects. While trying to figure out cures and surgeries for vaginal injuries, he experimented on enslaved women without anesthesia; at the time, it was commonly believed that black people felt less pain than white people.

Another interesting figure was Thomas Jefferson. Thomas Jefferson has been heavily discussed before, but I still found it interesting to hear someone speak as him anyway. Thomas Jefferson appears to have had a very complex view on slavery; he generally critiqued it, but he also owned over 600 slaves. Eventually, it appears he settled on the idea of gradual emancipation, but historians still debate over his true view.

I greatly enjoyed our "town hall meeting" as historical figures. It was interesting to hear differing perspectives from an era that was so different than the one we are in now. Watching people present through these different lenses provided a more contemporary view of how we interpret these figures.