(Louis Volker / Fourth Estate)

A winter snow exposed whose legacy matters — and whose remains expendable

BY PHILIP WILKERSON, CONTRIBUTOR

Earlier this winter, George Mason University’s campus was blanketed in snow. As facilities crews worked to clear walkways and keep campus moving, snow was plowed onto Wilkins Plaza, directly covering the Enslaved People Memorial. 

While there was no malicious intent behind this decision, the impact was nonetheless troubling. 

When the names of enslaved people are physically obscured, even unintentionally, it sends a powerful and painful message about whose histories are prioritized and whose are still treated as expendable.

Let me be clear. This is not an indictment of facilities staff or the individuals tasked with keeping our campus safe and accessible. They were doing their jobs. However, intention does not erase impact. The impact of covering the memorial, particularly during Black History Month, is a visible reminder of how easily Black history can be overlooked, minimized or silenced.

That visibility matters deeply to me, in part because of experiences from my own childhood.

Growing up, my mother, who was active in the nonprofit Jack and Jill of America, made sure that I attended an annual enslaved people memorial at Mount Vernon Plantation. 

As a teenager, I admit I did not appreciate it. We would wake up early on Saturday, when I felt I had far better things to do, and head to Mount Vernon. I was impatient, disinterested and embarrassingly dismissive.

At the memorial, we were handed a list of the names of people enslaved by George Washington. We would stand and read them aloud. 

Penny, age 2. Charles. Walter. The names went on and on, dozens after dozens. 

I do not remember every name now, but I remember the weight of reading them aloud. I remember realizing that these were not abstractions or footnotes. These were people, children, families and lives.

What strikes me now is how ashamed I feel of my teenage indifference. That memorial was teaching me something I did not yet have the maturity to understand. Naming the enslaved is an act of dignity and resistance against erasure.

The irony is that this history was quite literally in my backyard. Mount Vernon Plantation was also the backdrop for my high school football team’s photos every year. I still have my senior photo with the main house behind us. Most of my teammates were Black young men, standing proudly in front of a site built on the labor of people who looked like us. 

That contrast between celebration and suffering — visibility and omission — has stayed with me ever since.

That is why seeing the Memorial to the Enslaved People of George Mason covered in snow matters. When names like Penny and James are hidden, even accidentally, it reflects a broader pattern in America. Black histories are often the first to be obscured and the last to be restored.

(Louis Volker / Fourth Estate)

This moment at Mason echoes events beyond our campus. In Philadelphia, the National Park Service removed an exhibit at the President’s House Site that told the stories of the nine people enslaved by George and Martha Washington while they lived there. Workers pried away panels that had been featured for more than 15 years detailing the city’s role in the transatlantic slave trade and the contradiction of slavery alonside the nation’s founding ideals. 

Outrage followed. The city sued, saying changes were made without consultation. The message many heard was clear: for some, the full story of America is still too uncomfortable to tell. 

There is a false narrative that acknowledging slavery, systemic injustice or the realities faced by Black Americans is an attack on the country itself, or an attempt to make white people feel guilty. That framing misses the point entirely.

Looking honestly at America’s full history does not mean you hate this country. It means you care enough to want it to do better.

James Baldwin captured this truth perfectly when he wrote, “I love America more than any other country in the world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.” 

Critique, when rooted in love, is not destruction. It is accountability.

Teaching children and students the full story of our nation is not about assigning guilt. It is about context. It is about understanding how past injustices shape present realities. It is about ensuring that the next generation grows up informed, empathetic and equipped to build a more just future.

When snow is piled on top of an enslaved people memorial, the lesson, intentional or not, is that remembrance is optional. But remembrance is not optional. Memory is a responsibility.

This moment invites us to slow down and think more carefully about how our decisions affect others. It asks us to consider impact alongside intention. It challenges institutions like George Mason University, which prides itself on its commitment to diversity and inclusion, to be especially mindful of how Black histories are treated in shared spaces.

We can do better. We must do better.