The National Museum of African American History and Culture is removing a rare slave ship timber from its “Slavery and Freedom” exhibit and sending it back to South Africa. On March 22, visitors will have their last chance to see the piece on display in Washington. The museum says the change follows a loan agreement that ends July 1.
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Doctors wish they wouldn'tAn effort to remedy harm from a race-based kidney test helps Black patients seeking transplantsYoung people are turning to old-school hobbies to get off their phonesNobody said vegetable gardens must be in the backyard. Put them out front if it's sunnyWhat to know about the embezzlement charges facing a former Chaldean Catholic bishop in California | School children visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture’s Middle Passage exhibit, behind a wooden timber, the artifact at right, from the slave ship, the São José-Paquete de Africa, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. People visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture’s Middle Passage exhibit, including a wooden timber, the artifact at left, from the slave ship, the São José-Paquete de Africa, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. Anehtra Richmond of Woodbridge, Va., speaks to a reporter while visiting the National Museum of African American History and Culture, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. Jim Cairnes of Birmingham, Ala., speaks to a reporter while visiting the National Museum of African American History and Culture, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. School children visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture’s Middle Passage exhibit, including a wooden timber, the artifact at back left, from the slave ship, the São José-Paquete de Africa, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. School children visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture’s Middle Passage exhibit, behind a wooden timber, the artifact at right, from the slave ship, the São José-Paquete de Africa, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. School children visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture’s Middle Passage exhibit, behind a wooden timber, the artifact at right, from the slave ship, the São José-Paquete de Africa, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. People visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture’s Middle Passage exhibit, including a wooden timber, the artifact at left, from the slave ship, the São José-Paquete de Africa, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. People visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture’s Middle Passage exhibit, including a wooden timber, the artifact at left, from the slave ship, the São José-Paquete de Africa, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. Anehtra Richmond of Woodbridge, Va., speaks to a reporter while visiting the National Museum of African American History and Culture, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. Anehtra Richmond of Woodbridge, Va., speaks to a reporter while visiting the National Museum of African American History and Culture, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. Jim Cairnes of Birmingham, Ala., speaks to a reporter while visiting the National Museum of African American History and Culture, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. Jim Cairnes of Birmingham, Ala., speaks to a reporter while visiting the National Museum of African American History and Culture, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. School children visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture’s Middle Passage exhibit, including a wooden timber, the artifact at back left, from the slave ship, the São José-Paquete de Africa, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. School children visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture’s Middle Passage exhibit, including a wooden timber, the artifact at back left, from the slave ship, the São José-Paquete de Africa, Friday, March 6, 2026, in Washington. WASHINGTON — A Smithsonian museum exhibit about the maritime journey that millions of Africans were forced to take across the Atlantic to slavery in the Americas will change later this month, when a remnant from one of the first sunken slave ships ever recovered is taken off display in Washington.says a timber piece of the slave ship, the São José-Paquete de Africa, on display in its “Slavery and Freedom” exhibit, will soon be prepared for a trip back to its home museum in South Africa. The 33-pound timber piece has been prominently displayed — seemingly suspended over a dark void, a ballast at its side — as part of a loan agreement to the museum since. The agreement, examined by The Associated Press, was initially five years and then was extended another five in 2021, ending July 1. The ship remnant will be among several items sent back to the Iziko Museums of South Africa later this year. Because of its delicate nature, a special crate has to be built for its transport. Other items from the ship, including the ballasts that served as counterweights for the human cargo, are remaining on display and will be returned to South Africa in two years. A manifesto of the cargo on the ship will replace the timber piece.The São José, a Portuguese vessel bound for Brazil with more than 400 captives from Mozambique, struck a rock and sank in December 1794 off the coast of Cape Town, South Africa. Half of the people aboard perished. Survivors were resold into slavery in the Western Cape, according to the Smithsonian. Recovered in 2015, the ship was identified and studied through the Slave Wrecks Project, an international network of institutions that confirmed it was associated with the trans-Atlantic slave trade. The ship is among the first known wreckage of such a ship that was recovered, in which enslaved Africans died. The São José piece is in the lowest public level of the museum and is part of the larger “Slavery and Freedom” exhibit, which focuses on the slave trade, including the ships and conditions of transport, as well as artifacts, such as shackles. The exhibit addresses the Middle Passage, an especially fraught part of the Atlantic Ocean crossing where many of the captives died. While there is no exact count, the number of people who perished during the journey is in the millions, according to Paul Gardullo, the assistant director of history at the National Museum of African American History and Culture.The alteration of the slavery exhibit comes at a time when any changes related to history and the American story at federal parks, museums or other public spaces are being scrutinized. President Donald Trump’s administration has focused on putting the U.S. in a good light as the country prepares to celebrateas part of an executive order signed in March 2025 by the Republican president, titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History.” The National Museum of African American History and Culture is one of the institutions named in the order. Michelle Commander, the museum’s deputy director, told the AP the exhibit change is entirely related to the loan agreement but understood the timing might raise questions. “That’s why we’re being transparent in this moment, because we are aware that there are those kinds of questions,” Commander said. “But, as we’ve said, this is really about the conservation needs of that item.” As part of the loan, Gardullo said, the South African government has a robust cultural patrimony law that dictates how its artifacts and historical materials are treated and how long they can be loaned out.Recent visitors to the National Museum of African American History and Culture spoke of the power of the display with the slave ship timber, unaware that it would be altered shortly. Lines wait to enter the darkened gallery, entitled the Middle Passage, where there is a solemnity as people study the dark space where the timber sits next to a ship’s ballast. The tangible nature of the exhibit takes it out of textbooks and into reality, said Krystina Hernandez, who was there chaperoning her 7-year-old son’s schoolmates. Anehtra Reynolds, from northern Virginia, was emotional as she exited the area. She said the presentation, including the artifacts and the darkness of the gallery, gave her a “piece of what they felt in terms of their misery.” “I think there was a sign in there that mentioned there were some slaves who starved themselves to death in hopes that they would, when they died, they would be returned to their land,” Reynolds said. Jim Carnes, who was in Washington visiting family from Birmingham, Alabama, said he was familiar with much of the information because he has worked in civil rights education in Birmingham and Montgomery, two places central to “The artifacts are extraordinarily powerful,” he said, adding that he’s left feeling sadness and anger, not just at the conditions of the enslaved people but at the current push by the federal government to “deny this ever happened.” Jorge Carvajal, who is originally from Colombia but lives with his wife in south Florida, said seeing the exhibit silenced the stereotypes, especially that Black people are unreasonably angry. “Empathy is what I’m trying to say. This will help people empathize a lot more. I mean, at least you would hope,” he said. Commander said the staff at the museum will work to make sure that the exhibit continues to have the same impact with the remaining artifacts and displays. “The story does not leave the museum because this timber is going to be returned to its owners,” she said.Martin photographs politics at the White House and Congress and has circumnavigated the globe as a pool photographer covering every Secretary of State since 2010. She is known for her multidisciplinary enterprise feature packages and is fluent in Spanish.
Lumber And Timber Industry Slavery National Museum Of African American History And C District Of Columbia General News Africa DC Wire Jim Carnes Black Experience Smithsonian Institution Jorge Carvajal World News Washington News Lifestyle Donald Trump Race And Ethnicity Entertainment Michelle Commander Politics Race And Ethnicity World News
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