A new statue commemorating the life and legacy of Solomon Northup is on display in Saratoga Springs through the fall. The statue serves as a reminder of American slavery.
Standing 13-feet tall, a bronze statue now sits on the Lincoln Bathhouse lawn. “Hope Out of Darkness” depicts Solomon Northup, whose 1853 memoir was transformed into the award-winning 2013 film “Twelve Years a Slave.”
New York State Office of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation Commissioner Pro Tempore Randy Simons says it was significant to unveil the statue on Northup's 218th birthday Thursday.
“Mr. Northup lived right here in Saratoga Springs with his wife and children. He was accomplished. He worked on the Champlain Canal, he worked on other New York waterways. He helped build the Troy Saratoga Railroad. He was an accomplished violinist. He played at several Saratoga Springs hotels. In fact, he was so good there was interest in him to move about and he had what he thought was an opportunity to be a traveling musician,” said Simons.
Born a free man, Northup was lured to Washington, D.C., and kidnapped into slavery in 1841.
The statue depicts Northup holding in a raised hand his memoir and the papers representing his the letters sent north to free him – the papers all Black Americans had to carry to freely move around the country.
In his other hand, Northup holds shackles.
“The sculpture depicts Solomon in motion. Stepping boldly forward, fleeing bondage and his eyes set on justice,” said Melissa Howell.
Melissa Howell is a descendant of Northup. She spoke later that evening at the Victoria Pool in Spa State Park about the power of having a physical representation of her ancestor’s story.
“The way we remember history, especially in public spaces is shaped by choices. And the public memory doesn’t only reflect the past, it builds meaning in the present. Therefore, what we chose to mark in bronze or in marble reflects our values and our priorities. For much of American history the voices and lives of Black Americans were excluded from public monuments with the landscape shaped by statues that speak the language of conquest, silence, and forgetting. But the tide is turning,” said Howell.
New York Parks’s Interpreter of African American History Lavada Nahon says Northup’s story can help us better understand the impact of federal fugitive slave laws in New York.
“The presence of so many free Blacks walking the streets of the cities and towns and rural villages in New York, young, growing healthier and stronger, newly-freed mixed in with Southern freedom seekers hiding amongst them as they traveled further North through the state to Canada or up the Eastern seaboard, was becoming more and more tempting as people struggled with the ups and downs of the economy — particularly following the war of 1812 and the ban on importing enslaved people from outside of the US,” said Nahon.
Commissioner Simons says there’s been a shift in which stories are told at historical sites throughout the state.
“It used to be the conversations were only about the property owner or the person of note on the property. We never talked about the Indigenous histories. We never talked about who lived in—used to be the attic or in the basement. It was, ‘oh those were the quarters of the enslaved.’ Now we’re saying, ‘well what’s behind that door? That’s where Jane lived, that’s where Hanover lived,’” said Simons.
The statue will be on display in Saratoga Springs through October 7th when it will head to its next touring exhibition stop in Boston.
