Bellamy Mansion Museum

Purpose: Supporting Lifelong Learning The mission of the Bellamy Mansion Museum is to interpret the social and architectural history of the mansion and its human relationships. Every aspect of that mandate is tied to the African Americans who built the mansion and who lived and worked there. Museum staff will undertake two interdependent public education projects: (1) create an audio tour and revise the visitor orientation video to present a racially balanced view of the artisans who built the mansion and the people who made up its antebellum household, and (2) emphasize the restoration of the original slave quarters. For the next three to five years, the museum will concentrate on the African-American aspect of its history. The two-story brick Italianate mansion and its virtually intact, unaltered slave quarters offer an exceptional opportunity to interpret a balanced view of mid-nineteenth-century life on the site, incorporating biographical information about several of the free and enslaved African-American men who built the mansion as well as information about the domestic workers who lived in the slave quarters. In this project, the museum will convey (1) the importance of this uncommon knowledge, (2) the stories of these people, (3) the significance of the restoration, and (4) its impact on broadening visitors' appreciation of American history.