Harvard agrees to relinquish early photos of slaves, ending a long legal battle [View all]
BOSTON (AP) Harvard University will relinquish 175-year-old photographs believed to be the earliest taken of enslaved people to a South Carolina museum devoted to African American history as part of a settlement with one of the subjects' descendants.
The photos of the subjects identified by Tamara Lanier as her great-great-great-grandfather Renty, whom she calls Papa Renty," and his daughter Delia will be transferred from the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology to the International African American Museum in South Carolina, the state where they were enslaved in 1850 when the photos were taken, a lawyer for Lanier said Wednesday.
The settlement marks the end of a 15-year battle between Lanier and the esteemed university to release the 19th-century daguerreotypes," a precursor to modern-day photographs. Laniers attorney Joshua Koskoff told The Associated Press that the resolution is an unprecedented victory for descendants of those enslaved in the U.S. and praised his client's yearslong determination in pursuing justice for her ancestors.
I think its one of one in American history, because of the combination of unlikely features: to have a case that dates back 175 years, to win control over images dating back that long of enslaved people thats never happened before," Koskoff said.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/15-battle-harvard-agrees-settlement-121026330.html
That's good. When I first clicked on the article, I thought maybe Trump was after the photos because they cast our country in a bad light.