The following digitized records come from holdings in UMD's University Archives, which serves to collect and preserve evidence of the functioning of the university in all its many facets, including administration, academics, athletics, the arts, facilities and grounds, and student life. Although a number of records were destroyed in the Great Fire of 1912, we can still find evidence of Black life on campus in the school's early years despite Black students being denied the right to study at UMD College Park until 1951. Through these existing traces, we can work toward a greater understanding of how the legacy of slavery reverberated through the experiences of Black people at the university. The images below mainly feature Black laborers working in a variety of roles—such as maintaining the grounds, constructing the buildings, and feeding and tending the campus community—and illustrate how the University of Maryland would not exist as we know it without Black life and labor.
If you would like to obtain copies of these materials from UA, please contact ua-ref@umd.edu.
Groundskeeping
1
of
18
Buildings, Rossborough Inn - [hay fields]
University of Maryland Print File photographs, Item 6052
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43359
Sprayed Ben Davis apples, October 20, 1909
Department of Entomology Records, Box 1, Item 6
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/2246
Two Men and an Ox Cart on Route 1, 1900
Leland Scott collection, Box 3
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43727
Two men removing a fumigating sheet tent from a tree, November 6, 1897
Department of Entomology Records, Item 292
Agricultural Experiment Station - Stacking wheat in slocks to be thrisked later
University of Maryland Print File photographs, Item 6292
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43774
Man spraying field with a horse-drawn sprayer, c. 1925
Department of Entomology records, Box 1, Item 221
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43594
Men with horses dusting a field of crops, undated
Department of Entomology records, Box 1, Item 94
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43607
Men with horses dusting a field of crops, undated
Department of Entomology records, Item 86
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43609
Two men spraying a field, undated
Department of Entomology records, Item 98
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43794
Three men using a Niagara gas sprayer, Spring 1905
Department of Entomology records, Box 1, Item 270
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43673
Crowd with Dr. David Walls, Spraying demonstration, Barclay, Maryland, March, 1907
Department of Entomology records, Item 162
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43834
Fumigation, Capt. R. S. Emory's Orchard, November 4, 1898
Department of Entomology Records, Box 1, Item 239
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43691
Group of men hand mixing spray, 1905
Department of Entomology records, Box 1, Item 167
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43707
Man standing with barrels and watering cans, undated
Department of Entomology Records, Item 295
https://hdl.handle.net/1903.1/43803
Man with shovel next to tree surrounded by a wire breeding cage, undated
Department of Entomology records, Accession 866A, Box 1, Item 266
[Yearbook photo featuring Black members of the kitchen staff, c. 1968]
University of Maryland Yearbooks, 1968 Terrapin, p. 156
Header Image: Agricultural Experiment Station - Stacking wheat in slocks to be thrisked later, University of Maryland Print File photographs, Item 6292
