On Thursday at 4:30 p.m. Hampden-Sydney College’s Atkinson Museum will open a show featuring the work of curator and research Elizabeth Baker in a gallery walk.

This exhibition will feature Baker’s collection of information regarding the African Americans associated with the college’s history.   

Baker says, “At a young age, I decided I was destined to become the next Indiana Jones.

My favorite activity was searching for my first important ‘archaeological discovery,’ and growing up at Hampden-Sydney—a college with an incredibly rich history—allowed me plenty of time and space for exploration.”

She goes on to highlight her first finding; “One day, near the college observatory, I was elated to ‘discover’ several dilapidated cabins, a chicken coop, an outhouse, abundant artifact scatters and even a small, mostly unmarked cemetery. For the next ten years, I regularly returned to those cabins, examining artifacts and trying to decipher details about their former inhabitants,” she said.

“To my disappointment, no matter how many people I asked, no one on campus seemed to know who had lived there, when, or why they left.”

These questions remained in Baker’s mind, and during her second year of graduate school, she was tasked with choosing a thesis topic.

“I set to work analyzing and piecing together census records, news articles, archived photographs, property maps and more. The product was a general overview of slavery and black history at Hampden-Sydney, focusing on four families and their relationships with the school,” Baker explained.

After completing her Master’s in History and Museum Studies at UNC Greensboro, Baker worked with Angela Way, Museum director and curator at Hampden-Sydney, to develop a walking tour of this piece of college history.

Baker favors the story of Rhoda Randolph and her family. Born 1865, Rhoda lived at Hampden-Sydney and worked as a laundress for the college boys.

She also worked for Dr. James R. Thornton as a live-in housekeeper until he provided her with a small plot of land across Via Sacra, in the wooded area now home to the college observatory. Randolph lived there in a small house with seven children—Lewis, Monroe, Mary, Peyton, Louise, Ida and Rhodie, as well as her niece, Edmonia Goldman, and her grandson, Francis.

Affectionately given the name Francis “the Axe Man” because he carried an axe everywhere he went, Francis lived near the observatory until he was moved to a nursing home in 1996. A well-known figure on campus, he chopped firewood for neighbors and friends in return for payment or meals. As an adult, Edmonia Goldman lived in the Mercy Seat community near Worsham and raised her own family, including daughter Frances. Goldman also worked at least part-time at Hampden-Sydney as a babysitter for campus families. Frances grew up to marry Willie Scott, a bell ringer and janitor for the college, and for years she ran the well-loved Log Cabin daycare program on campus.

Two of her children—Willie, Jr., and Delores—also worked at H-SC in food service.

The family is an incredible legacy and just one example of many whose members have worked at Hampden-Sydney for more than a century.

Visit blogs.hsc.edu/untoldstory or for more stories; if you have information to contribute contact Elizabeth Baker at ebaker@hsc.edu.

The exhibit is sponsored by the Hampden-Sydney College Atkinson Museum and runs through the end of the fall semester.