LAPLACE, La. — Jo Banner is excited to show the newly acquired Woodland Plantation House near the banks of the Mississippi River. “We have still a lot of work to do, but I think for the home to be from 1793, it looks rather good,” she beams.
The raised creole-style building has a rusty tin roof and a wide front porch. Forest green wooden shutters cover the windows and doors. The site is historically significant because this is where one of the largest slave revolts in U.
S. history began. It’s also known as the German Coast Uprising because this region was settled by German immigrants.
“The start of the 1811 revolt happened here, on this porch,” Banner says. Banner and her twin sister Joy are co-founders of the Descendants Project , a non-profit in Louisiana’s heavily industrialized river parishes – just west of New Orleans. Early this year, the group bought the Woodland Plantation Home, putting it in Black ownership for the first time in more than two centuries.
“Our mission is to eradicate the legacies of slavery so for us, it's the intersection of historic preservation, the preservation of our communities, which are also historic, and our fight for environmental justice,” says Joy Banner. The sisters plan to preserve it as a museum that will reinterpret the 1811 uprising as inspiration for new generations to confront racism. “While others may see a beautiful plantation home, for us, this space means a lot,” Jo Banner says.
“It's the knowing we have.
