When you walk through Washington, D .C. today,
the monuments you see towering over the avenues,
they feel entirely inevitable. Right, like they
were just always meant to be there. Exactly.
We tend to look at them and think, well, of course
that's there. It's set in stone. Literally. Yeah.
But the monuments that were successfully blocked,
the ones that never made it off the drafting
table, they often tell us much more about the
actual fabric of American history. Oh, absolutely.
The empty spaces. Right. So today we're taking
you on a deep dive into a nearly forgotten yet
deeply, deeply significant chapter. It's about
a monument that almost radically altered the
landscape of the nation's capital. It's a fascinating
look at a legislative battle that almost nobody
talks about today. No, they really don't. And
we're focusing not on what was built, but what
was built. wasn't. And to do this, we're pulling
from a really compelling stack of archival materials.
We're looking at a comprehensive Wikipedia article
detailing the proposed, quote unquote, Mammy
Memorial. And this synthesizes historical newspaper
archives, things like the Chicago Tribune and
the New York World. Right. Alongside official
congressional records. Exactly. So we have a
really solid documentary foundation for this
deep dive. We do. And. Because this text dives
into intensely charged racial and political themes
from the 1920s, We want to be clear up front
about our approach today. Yeah, that's important.
We're here purely as your guides through this
historical archive. We are looking impartially
at how this event unfolded in the historical
record without taking sides, endorsing any viewpoints,
or injecting modern judgment. Right. Our goal
is simply to unpack the mechanics of how this
massive public relations and legislative battle
was fought exactly as it was documented a century
ago. Okay, let's unpack this. To understand how
this almost became a permanent bronze fixture
in the Capitol, we actually have to rewind more
than a decade before the major legislative push.
Yeah, the timeline on this is longer than you'd
think. It really is. The chronological journey
doesn't begin in the roaring 20s. The initial
spark first surfaced in print back in May of
1910. 1910. Wow. Yeah. There was an article published
in the Chicago Tribune by a writer named Hollis
Field. And reading through the archives, you
know, this wasn't just a fleeting thought piece
or like a what if scenario. It had actual momentum.
It did. An actual organization formed around
this concept. They were called the Mamie Memorial
Institute and they were based out of Athens,
Georgia. And they were actively seeking public
donations to fund a physical national monument.
Right. And we need to clearly define the specific
purpose of the monument they were trying to fund
here. The stated goal of this institute was to
erect a memorial honoring enslaved African domestic
workers of the antebellum South. Right. Or who
were referred to pejoratively as mammies. Yeah.
The movement to build this was fundamentally
an attempt to take that specific caricature,
that highly romanticized memory of the antebellum
period, and solidify it into a permanent national
structure. Wait, so. How does an idea generated
by a local institute in Athens, Georgia in 1910
gather enough momentum to become a serious proposition
for the landscape of Washington, D .C.? It's
a massive leap. Because by 1923, this wasn't
just a localized Southern effort anymore. It
wasn't at all. It had reached the highest levels
of the United States government. The political
push became highly organized and incredibly serious.
By 1923, Mississippi Senator John Sharp Williams
introduced a formal bill in Congress for the
monument's construction. And this legislation
had serious institutional weight behind it. It
was backed by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
The UDC. Exactly. That is a massive detail. I
mean, they weren't just a small historical society.
They were an absolute powerhouse at the time
when it came to shaping public memory and lobbying
for monuments, weren't they? Absolutely. Having
their backing was a prerequisite for moving something
like this from a regional idea to a national
priority. But the archival record reveals something
even more striking about the political reception
of this bill. When Congressman Charles Manley
Stedman of North Carolina made a passionate speech
on the floor of the U .S. House of Representatives
in favor of constructing this monument. The congressional
records actually note. that his speech was cheered.
Wow. And not just by a faction of his own party.
It was cheered by representatives of both the
Republican and Democratic parties. That is a
remarkable image to visualize. You have this
sweeping bipartisan applause echoing in the House
of Representatives for a monument dedicated to
a pejorative caricature of enslaved women. It
really is. And the bipartisan cheering reveals
something crucial for you to understand about
1923 Washington. The romanticization of the Confederacy
in the Antebellum South wasn't just a localized
Southern project anymore. At that specific moment,
it had been wholly embraced by the national political
establishment. It had gone mainstream. Exactly.
It was a mainstream political proposition moving
through the legislative process with massive
tailwinds. With that kind of overwhelming bipartisan
support, it probably seemed like a done deal
to a lot of people. Oh, absolutely. And here's
where it gets really interesting. Because they
were already treating it like one. This wasn't
just abstract legislation floating around a committee
room somewhere. No, it was tangible. The physical
reality of the proposed memorial was already
taking shape in art studios. The United Daughters
of the Confederacy were actively soliciting and
receiving design proposals from sculptors and
architects to win this really high profile commission.
And when you look at the artists involved, it
shows how seriously the art world was taking
this commission. Right. The texts highlight two
specific sculptors who were deeply involved in
the design phase. First, there was a Canadian
-American sculptor named Ulrich Stonewall Jackson
Dunbar. And he wasn't just sketching ideas on
a napkin. The records indicate that by June of
1923, Dunbar had already created a physical maquette.
of his proposal. Which means he was incredibly
far along in the process. He already had a physical,
small -scale, three -dimensional model of this
monument sitting right there in his studio, just
waiting for the green light to be scaled up and
cast in bronze. Exactly. It brings the reality
of the monument very close to the finish line.
But Dunbar was competing against another highly
notable name, George Julian Zolney. And his background
provides a fascinating juxtaposition for this
specific project. Oh, yeah. Zolney was an immigrant.
He was a Romanian and Hungarian -American. I
have to pause you there. How does an Eastern
European immigrant, who presumably has zero familial
connection to the antebellum South, end up as
the premier sculptor for a Confederate -backed
monument? It's one of those brilliant, ironic
details you only find in the historical archives.
Despite his Eastern European roots, Zolny had
earned a very specific, highly lucrative title.
What was it? He was known as the sculptor of
the Confederacy. You're kidding. No. And he earned
that moniker purely through market demand. He
had successfully undertaken numerous commissions
of Confederate subjects on behalf of wealthy
Southern clients. Wow. So he had a proven track
record of delivering exactly what this specific
demographic wanted. OK, so the gears are fully
in motion. You have the public donations, the
powerful lobbying from the UDC, the bipartisan
cheers in the House of Representatives and establish
highly regarded sculptors with physical models
already built. It's all lined up. If you stopped
reading the history right there in the summer
of 1923, the construction of this monument. feels
entirely inevitable. Absolutely. But of course,
as we established at the beginning of our deep
dive, if you go to Washington, D .C. today, it
isn't there. Right. So we have to look at what
happened next, which was an immediate, intense,
and incredibly fierce pushback. Yes. As soon
as the momentum behind this proposed monument
became public knowledge, it hit an absolute wall
of condemnation. A brick wall. The coalition
that formed to oppose it was diverse, highly
vocal, and incredibly strategic. The texts note
that it was immediately condemned by African
-Americans nationwide, but they were joined by
other organized groups. For instance, the Women's
Relief Corps, the Grand Army of the Republic,
stood in firm opposition. And for context for
you listening, the Grand Army of the Republic
was the primary organization for Union Civil
War veterans, making the Women's Relief Corps
their official auxiliary. So you even have the
descendants and families of Union veterans stepping
into the fray to block this. And they didn't
just quietly disagree in private meetings. No,
they did not. The way this opposition utilized
the media is a masterclass in 1920s grassroots
organizing. It really is. They took the fight
directly to the pages of the biggest papers of
the day. Major media outlets joined the opposition,
notably the New York World newspaper, which publicly
condemned the project. But one of the most prominent
individual voices in this media pushback was
Mary Church Terrell. Right. She wrote an editorial
condemning the monument that was published in
the Washington Evening Star. And the crucial
detail about Terrell's editorial wasn't just
that she wrote it, but its reach. The archives
highlight that this piece was widely circulated.
It went everywhere. Yet it wasn't contained to
a single local audience. It became a broader
rallying cry that clearly articulated the deep
offense of the monument. But the pushback wasn't
limited to just text and intellectual editorials.
If you look at the archives of the Chicago Defender
from that week, they deployed a highly powerful,
provocative visual campaign as well. Oh, yes.
The cartoon. Yeah. They published a political
cartoon that depicted. A white southerner proudly
presenting the architectural plans for the Mamie
Monument. Right. But he isn't presenting them
to a politician or a crowd of supporters. He
is presenting the plans to the hanging body of
a lynching victim. That is. That is a remarkably
heavy image to digest. Yeah. It violently punctures
the polite, sterilized rhetoric that was happening
on the floor of the House of Representatives.
It strips away all the political theater, doesn't
it? It absolutely does. What's fascinating here
is how effectively that single image cuts to
the core of the opposition's argument. It contrasts
the fabricated, romanticized fantasy of the antebellum
South with the visceral, horrific reality of
the racial violence that black Americans were
facing. Right then in 1923. Exactly. When you
break down the historical commentary from the
opposition during this time, they were attacking
the memorial from two very distinct angles. So
they had a two -pronged strategy. What were the
specific arguments? The first argument was deeply
ideological. Right. They argued the memorial
was inherently objectionable. It was an offensive
caricature designed to celebrate an institution
of slavery. Right. But the second argument was
purely pragmatic, focusing on economics. Oh.
Interesting. Yeah. Commentators pointed out that
building a massive national bronze monument is
an incredibly expensive endeavor. They argued
it was a massive waste of public and private
funds. And more importantly, they argued that
those funds could and should be better utilized
to actively improve the lives of living black
people rather than pouring money into stone to
honor a fabricated memory. It's such a sharp.
undeniable critique. You have all this capital
to build a statue of a myth. But what about the
actual citizens living right now? Precisely.
And this outrage, the wide circulation of Terrell's
editorial, the visceral cartoons in the Chicago
Defender, the pragmatic economic arguments. It
didn't just stay in the newspapers as intellectual
debate. It translated into direct targeted political
action. Yes. The public mobilize. The mobilization
was incredibly focused. The opposition recognized
that simply being angry in the press wasn't enough
to stop a bill with bipartisan support. They
had to apply pressure directly to legislative
leadership. Right. The archives detail how letters
and petitions began to absolutely flood the desks
of top politicians in Washington. And they aimed
right for the top. We're not just talking about
angry letters to local lower level representatives.
No, they targeted the highest levels of the executive
and legislative branches. The records emphasize
a staggering. logistical achievement for this
pressure campaign. Petitions were sent directly
to Vice President Calvin Coolidge, as well as
to the Speaker of the House, Frederick H. Gillett.
Wow. And the text specifically notes that these
petitions carry the signatures of 2 ,000 black
women. Let's just pause and think about the sheer
logistical effort required to pull that off in
1923. It's monumental. Two thousand individual
signatures from black women gathered, bundled
and delivered directly to the vice president's
desk. There is no Internet. There are no social
media campaigns or email blasts. No, it's all
analog. That is pure ground level coordination,
knocking on doors, organizing through local networks
and ensuring those physical pages made it to
the most powerful desks in the country. It is
a profound testament to the power of organized
civic action. They built an undeniable political
force. And we see the direct result of that intense
pressure in the archives. The outcome is definitive.
The controversy surrounding the monument became
so immense and the public outcry so organized
and targeted that the political will to pass
the legislation simply evaporated. The momentum
completely flatlines? Yes. The bill was entirely
dropped. No further action was ever taken on
it in Congress. The grassroots campaign successfully
halted the legislation in its tracks. So what
does this all mean? How does a defeated bill
from 1923 impact us today? Well, to fully grasp
the reality of what was avoided, we have to look
at the physical location where this monument
was slated to be built. Right. The geography
of it. The Congressional Archives reveal that
the proposed site for the Mamie Memorial was
a highly prominent spot on Massachusetts Avenue.
Massachusetts Avenue is, of course, a major thoroughfare
in Washington, D .C., known as Embassy Row, and
it's heavily populated with significant statues
and monuments. Yeah, it's a very visible location.
For decades, the specific spot intended for this
memorial remained a phantom space, a site defined
entirely by the legislation that failed to alter
it. But the historical record provides a fascinating
postscript to this whole saga. Oh. In 2002, the
site on Massachusetts Avenue was ultimately filled.
But obviously not by anything resembling the
1923 proposal. Correct. The site was filled by
a completely different monument altogether. It's
now a statue of Tomáša Garík Masaryk, the first
president of Czechoslovakia. Wow. What a shift.
It really is. And if we connect this to the bigger
picture. Why should you, listening to this right
now, care about a statue that was never built?
Why spend time unpacking a ghost monument? It
is because this history perfectly illustrates
how public memory is negotiated in real time.
It shows us that the physical landscape of a
nation's capital is not an inevitability handed
down from above. It is the result of continuous
active struggle. It proves that history isn't
just a top -down mandate. Exactly. This event
demonstrates with crystal clarity how organized
grassroots information campaigns utilizing targeted
petitions, widely circulated editorials, and
provocative political cartoons can successfully
halt the physical altering of public space. It's
incredibly empowering. The citizens of 1923 prove
that even when a bill has bipartisan cheers in
Congress and wealthy backers commissioning scale
models from famous sculptors, it can be starved
by the coordinated voices of those who refuse
to let a false narrative be cast in bronze. It
really makes you look at every empty park and
every completed statue in a totally different
light. Let's do a quick recap of the incredible
archival journey we just took. We started with
a fleeting newspaper idea in the Chicago Tribune
back in 1910. We watched it grow into a fully
fledged congressional bill introduced in 1923,
backed by the incredibly powerful United Daughters
of the Confederacy and cheered by both Republicans
and Democrats. We saw the maquettes being built
by the, quote unquote, smelter of the Confederacy.
and fierce demise of the whole project, brought
down by an unstoppable coalition of African -American
citizens, women's groups, and media outlets who
utilize striking imagery and thousands of physical
signatures to force the government to drop the
bill entirely. This raises an important question.
If a prominent spot on Massachusetts Avenue can
transition from being the proposed site of a
1923 Confederate -backed monument to ultimately
becoming the home of a 2002 statue of a Czechoslovakian
president, What does the evolving invisible history
of empty public spaces tell us about the ever
-changing values of a society over a century?
The spaces where nothing was built can sometimes
speak just as loudly as the monuments that stand
there today. That is such a fascinating thought
to leave on. Thank you so much for joining us
on this deep dive into the historical archives
today. We hope this exploration has given you
a new perspective on the intricate, often invisible
legislative and public relations battles that
shape the cities we walk through. Keep questioning
the history around you, look closely at the monuments
that surround you, and maybe even look a little
closer at the empty spaces too. See you next
time.