Sara Fuller, Citizen of the Lenape Indian Tribe of Delaware
Date2022
Artist
Will Wilson
(American photographer, born 1969)
MediumArchival pigment print from wet plate collodion scan
Dimensionsimage: 19 3/8 × 15 1/4 in. (49.2 × 38.7 cm)
sheet: 22 × 17 in. (55.9 × 43.2 cm)
sheet: 22 × 17 in. (55.9 × 43.2 cm)
Credit LineF. V. du Pont Acquisition Fund, 2022
Object number2022-55
On View
Not on viewClassificationsPHOTOGRAPH
Label TextI have brought my ancestors with me. The painting is my great-great-grandfather, Samuel Loatman, born at Woodland Beach in 1826. In 1839, Sam became an Indentured Servant to learn the trade of farming. Sam was given just “ten dollars in leu of an education” and at the end of his contract at age 21, given “two suits of clothes suitable to his condition.” Sam farmed in Woodland Beach for most of his life before moving inland. He had 21 children, from Sara Sammons (Millsboro) and Mary Durham (Cheswold). The photograph is of Sam’s son Eli and Annie Consealor Loatman, my great-grandparents who owned a farm in Bridgeton, NJ.My sister and I are the keepers of our family history. At a time when horseshoe crabs were plentiful, my father (who knew very little of the deep family history) would often take us to our homeland of Woodland Beach. Through research and DNA, we went from knowing very little of our ancestry to discovering a treasure trove of factual and surprising information, to establishing new family relationships! We discovered our Lenape ancestors and the reasons why they moved inland to Smyrna and Cheswold. Some moved just across the bay into New Jersey where they found greater and more promising opportunities for people of color. All that I wear around my neck, has significance; my medicine bag, a deer antler choker to protect my voice and truth, a handmade necklace from an older relative, and the ashes of my niece Marisa Wenona Harris (she was on the same journey with us) who was tragically killed in 2017.
My great Aunt Eulalie inspired our journey when she wrote a short history of the family entitled “The Root and The Vine.” My sister Leigh and I continue to transform her story from being just family lore to a real story that is now documented.
—Sara Miller Fuller
