Urban Enslaved Exhibit is Now Open at Davenport House Museum
Monday, November 13th, 2023
Nov. 10, 2023, The Davenport House Museum’s Urban Enslaved Exhibit – a project eight years in the making – is now open, detailing the lives of 13 enslaved people who lived and worked in Isaiah Davenport’s mansion in the 1820s.
“With the opening of this exhibit, we are able at last to tell the complete story of the Davenport House," said Austin Hill, Chair of the Board of Historic Savannah Foundation. The Davenport House, which HSF operates as a house museum, was the first of more than 420 historic buildings – and counting – which the organization has saved from destruction.”
The completion of the Urban Enslaved Exhibit marks the third and final phase of what HSF has dubbed its “Kennedy Pharmacy Campaign.” The first phase involved the preservation and restoration of the Kennedy Pharmacy directly behind the Davenport House at 323 Broughton St., which now houses the Davenport House Museum Shop on the ground floor and HSF’s offices upstairs.
The completion of the exhibit was marked by a ribbon cutting on Thursday, Nov. 9. Savannah Mayor Van Johnson was in attendance along with HSF’s president and CEO Sue Adler, the exhibit’s top donor Mills Morrison, HSF board chair Austin Hill, Davenport House executive director Danielle Hodes, Josh Brooks with Josh Brooks Construction and Brian Felder with Felder & Associates.
The exhibit designer Doug Mund spoke at the ribbon cutting. Mund has worked with HSF for eight years, bringing to life its exhibits, as well as the facility planner and designer of The Davenport House shop and the timeline housed in the Preservation Center. Dmdg2 is a local design agency that specializes in museum planning, exhibit planning and exhibit design. A few notable projects include The Louvre in Paris, France, and The Smithsonian.
The Urban Enslaved Exhibit depicts the basement’s dual function as a workspace and living area for these individuals during that time. Interpretive panels provide information about their lives based on available documentary evidence, as well as insights into the Gullah Geechee culture they likely practiced. These stories are essential to telling a more complete history of the house which cannot be achieved without recognizing the foundational role played by these individuals in contributing to the prosperity of both the Davenports and the city of Savannah.
