Renaming Jefferson school.
Klinker said:
It is said that people become "more themselves" as they age. For some, this can be an ugly process.
I think they lose their filters. There’s no more need to pretend, that person they have become is actually the person they always were.
I find this so upsetting. How can a name be changed so quickly. Don’t the citizens get any input. I graduated from Jefferson as did my children. How was this woman involved with Jefferson School. Jefferson was a great president. I think the Board of Ed needs a history lesson.
galileo said:
I find this so upsetting. How can a name be changed so quickly. Don’t the citizens get any input. I graduated from Jefferson as did my children. How was this woman involved with Jefferson School. Jefferson was a great president. I think the Board of Ed needs a history lesson.
Jefferson was a reasonable president, not great, and a slaveowner. I applaud activism led by younger people. Things don't have to be the way they were when we were kids. Change is okay.
galileo said:
Change is okay? Teenagers are influenced by adults. They had help.
teenagers? It's an elementary school.
Anyway, I don't know why people get so upset at name changes. I went to a Jefferson elementary school myself, in NY. I could give a hoot if they changed to a better name. It's just a reflection of growth and maturity.
DB If you read the article it states students from CHS decided the change. Thus,teenagers.
galileo said:
DB If you read the article it states students from CHS decided the change. Thus,teenagers.
I did read the article, and frankly, it's quite confusing. But I don't see where it says CHS students picked the name. I thought elementary kids picked the name - but even there I wasn't sure.
Where does it say CHS students picked the name?
You know what, we need changes in this world. The people who want things to stay the same as they were 50 years ago are the people who have left us the country we have. Time to step back and watch the younger generation try to fix this awful mess. The last generation has set the bar awfully low.
DB ,Anyway there were 14 kids that made the name choice.Delia Bolden was the first Black woman to graduate from CHS in 1912.She aspired to be a teacher.She wrote an essay called A Plea for the Negro against suppression of voting rights in the school yearbook and read it at graduation.
I just do not know what connection she has to Jefferson School. By the way the Maplewood Memorial Library has all the CHS yearbooks on line.
galileo said:
I just do not know what connection she has to Jefferson School. By the way the Maplewood Memorial Library has all the CHS yearbooks on line.
What connection does Jefferson have with the school? A far more distant one than Delia Bolden.
I did not know I would have so many negatives.Maplewood was originally called Jefferson Village so I can see that. Also it was a part of my growing up - kndgtn through sixth grade. And same for my 2 sons so I was involved many years. I love history and always admired Jefferson’swritings,etc.
galileo said:
I did not know I would have so many negatives. Maplewood was originally called Jefferson Village so I can see that. Also it was a part of my growing up - kndgtn through sixth grade. And same for my 2 sons so I was involved many years. I love history and always admired Jefferson’swritings,etc.
To be fair, you started negative. Understandable, since you were upset, but isn’t it also understandable how others might respond?
I'm not a fan of the name change. Slavery was a horrible practice - but it wasn't illegal. Without Jefferson's voice, we may not have eliminated the practice as soon as we did.
He prohibited the importation of slaves:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_presidents_of_the_United_States_who_owned_slaves
Jefferson included a clause in his initial draft of the Declaration of Independence denouncing George III for forcing the slave trade onto the American colonies; this was not included in the final version. In 1778, with Jefferson's leadership, slave importation was banned in Virginia, one of the first jurisdictions worldwide to do so. Jefferson was a lifelong advocate of ending the Atlantic Slave Trade and as president led the effort to make it illegal, signing a law that passed Congress in 1807, shortly before Britain passed a similar law.
In 1779, as a practical solution, Jefferson supported gradual emancipation, training, and colonization of African-American slaves rather than immediate manumission, believing that releasing unprepared persons with no place to go and no means to support themselves would only bring them misfortune.
I'm more on board with removing confederate statues - these people were fighting to keep slavery going 80 years after Jefferson started to turn the tide.
Also - these president's also owned slaves - are we also going to strip them of their history also?
George Washington, Andrew Jackson, Zachary Taylor, James Madison, James Monroe, John Tyler, James K. Polk, William Henry Harrison, Andrew Johnson, Martin Van Buren, Ulysses S. Grant
What will be next?
I dunno Jamie.
Doesn't matter if it was legal. Slavery might be the worst evil one person can inflict on another. Certainly up there near the top.
Maybe that should be the line as to whether we treat people as Great Men or not.
(also, jeebus but MOL is slow tonight)
yeah - it was down for a sec - sent a message to my server guys about it.
Yes, slavery is one of the worst evils and Jefferson actually did quite a lot to start the move towards the abolishment of it.
jamie said:
Also - these president's also owned slaves - are we also going to strip them of their history also?
What history is being stripped, either from Jefferson or the school?
(My elementary school, built in 1932 and named for the town, has been a church of one denomination or another since the 1980s. That wasn’t what stripped its history. This was: Silence about its role in one of the cases that led to Brown v. Education.)
I can well understand both sides, but Jefferson already has a huge memorial in DC. This won't change history, but it will add to it.
As pointed out, Jefferson School wasn't named after Thomas Jefferson, it was the "Jefferson School" because it was in "Jefferson Village". If the community had changed its name to "Maplewood" before the school was instituted, it would have been "Maplewood School".
In my opinion, Thomas Jefferson had nothing to do with the school, so his good points and bad points are irrelevant for a decision on whether to name the school after someone to mark a community milestone.
Who was Jefferson Village named after? Stanley Jefferson of the New Jersey Jeffersons?
Jefferson village was named after Thomas Jefferson.
https://www.livingplaces.com/NJ/Essex_County/Maplewood_Township.html
Jefferson wrote of freeing slaves, but never freed his own. He wrote of freeing them in his will, but died in so much debt that his heirs sold them off, breaking up families. He raped Sally Hemmings, and kept their child as a slave. Great writing without any personal action. Just hypocrisy. But what I really like is a group of younger people standing up for what they want, regardless of the wishes of the old people who have done irreparable harm to the nation and planet.
He also largely wrote the gd Declaration of Independence.
It’s a good read.
drummerboy said:
Who was Jefferson Village named after? Stanley Jefferson of the New Jersey Jeffersons?
Stanley Jefferson of the New York Mets.
drummerboy said:
Who was Jefferson Village named after? Stanley Jefferson of the New Jersey Jeffersons?
Jaytee said:
Jefferson village was named after Thomas Jefferson.
https://www.livingplaces.com/NJ/Essex_County/Maplewood_Township.html
Yes, I know that. I was just pointing out that the original intent of naming the school was probably not "Let's honor Thomas Jefferson", as opposed to naming it after the place it was located.
Historical cleansing seems a tricky thing to me. So many people who have helped to build great things also have significant flaws. Would it not be better to look at a person and say what are the great things they accomplished in their lives and honor them accordingly? The Founding Fathers, whatever the flaws, built a nation that has stood the test of time pretty well. On the other hand, if I look at Confederate generals, you see that the greatest accomplishments in their lives was leading a fight to preserve a slave-owning white supremacist society. So, I don't have a problem with naming things after the Founding Fathers or Union generals, perhaps. But honoring Confederate generals is in a different category.
And sometimes, the full telling of a persons story is interesting. Nathaniel Bedford Forrest, towards the end of his life, renounced the activities of the KKK and oppression of Blacks. Perhaps too little, too late, but the change of heart is a story worth telling.
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This guy? I wonder what type of illness he’s got.