In the hierarchy of museums, historic houses often take the prize for most stuck in the past. Literally marketed as “frozen in time,” they tend to place the lifestyles of the rich, the famous (or the briefly notable in many cases) on a pedestal. So how can institutions so firmly rooted in the past be brought meaningfully into the present? Tudor Place sought out to accomplish this with the award-winning installation and guided tour “Ancestral Spaces: People of African Descent at Tudor Place.”

The catalyst for change came in two forms. First, the descendant engagement movement that took root in many institutions knocked at the door of Tudor Place. Ann Chinn, a descendant of the Twine family and a member of the Mount Vernon League of Descendants, reached out to Tudor Place because Martha Peter, the first owner of Tudor Place, inherited Ms. Chinn’s ancestors when Martha’s grandmother, Martha Washington, died in 1802. In 2021, Ms. Chinn collaborated with Tudor Place on a family tree that included the biological link between Hannah Pope, her ancestor, and the Peter family. Tudor Place began proactively searching for descendants. Through a public family tree posted on Ancestry.com, we located Karl Haynes, whose ancestor, John Luckett, was the Tudor Place gardener from 1862 to 1906. We invited Mr. Haynes to visit the site in 2022 and explore the grounds where Mr. Luckett had spent decades of his life, as well as handle the tools Mr. Luckett likely used.

These intimate moments of trust-building with Ann Chinn and Karl Haynes were crucial for the success of “Ancestral Spaces.”

The second impetus for an interpretive shift was an Institution of Museum and Library Services Inspire! grant awarded to conduct research on the site’s history of enslavement, which enabled Tudor Place to hire a dedicated researcher. This work enriched Tudor Place’s understanding of this history and provided new ways to frame this content. The grant called for a small concluding exhibit to share findings with visitors. We felt the most meaningful solution would be to reimagine a guided tour of the historic house from the perspective of enslaved individuals. We also felt strongly it should be the only tour option available for visitors and not marketed as a peripheral “specialty tour.” A timetable for “Ancestral Spaces” was set to run from February to April 2024, but its success led to its extension for almost the entire year.

Tudor Place assembled an Advisory Committee including Ann Chinn, Karl Haynes and other stakeholders involved with interpreting Black history in Georgetown. They were the true curators. Tudor Place viewed its role more as a facilitator seeking to translate the committee’s vision into a form that would work within the historic space and on a meager budget. This process required Tudor Place to do more listening than talking and to consider interpretive tools that had never been used on a guided tour. For example, the Advisory Committee wanted an introductory film. The descendants wrote the script, and a quickly self-taught staff set up a two-camera shot and hired an editor to put it together. Completed within a week for $250, the film would go on to be seen by thousands of visitors as descendants welcomed them into their “ancestral space.”

At the Advisory Committee’s insistence, “Ancestral Spaces” came to life in a multisensory way through audio stations that featured excerpts from a 1993 oral history recorded by Hannah Pope’s granddaughter, Hannah Nash Williams. Recorded on cassette tape when Hannah Williams was 87 years old, we digitized the tapes to be integrated into audio stations throughout the guided tour. Hearing the voice of a woman whose grandmother was enslaved at Tudor Place brought visitors powerfully close to this history.

Perhaps the most effective and visually arresting storytelling technique was the replacement of portraits of the site’s enslavers with those of descendants. Few images of the people enslaved at Tudor Place exist. As the standard historic house solution, we suggested to the Advisory Committee options of hanging silhouettes or printed names. They responded, “Why not just put us up on the wall?” The brilliant idea made a powerful impression on visitors at the very beginning of the tour in the Tudor Place drawing room. These portraits projected the message that all the extravagance of the grand rooms was inextricably tied to the institution of slavery and the exploitation of the ancestors of the people in these photographs.

Visitor responses to “Ancestral Spaces” were overwhelmingly positive with many expressing gratitude for Tudor Place making such a bold statement. Some noted that bringing these stories to the forefront was refreshing, and for some it was the first time they had felt comfortable at a site of enslavement. “Ancestral Spaces” has unlocked new doors at Tudor Place. The innovative storytelling techniques and the authoritative voice of descendants were a form of reparative justice acknowledging that Tudor Place had failed to fully and accurately interpret their ancestors’ history.

The most frequent question staff received after “Ancestral Spaces” closed in late 2024 was, “What are you going to do now?” Completely extracting the Peter family from the guided tour for a year revealed that an engaging experience could be created without so much focus on the homeowners. However, balancing interpretation between the Peter family and those enslaved who lived and labored at the site suddenly became easier because stories about enslaved individuals had become just as rich in a fraction of the time as those shared about Peter family members for decades. Most vitally, the site’s relationship with descendants continues to build with more collaborations on the horizon as a new dawn rises over the once-static historic house experience.

Rob DeHart, Curator
Washington, DC | June 2025