‘Entangled Lives’ Exposes America’s Complex Racial Story

Sweet Briar College will host “Entangled Lives,” a presentation by two women who share an extraordinary and complicated history, at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 22, in Memorial Chapel. It’s a tale that traverses much of the country, including Virginia.

Ann Neel and Pam Smith thought their stories first intersected in 1990, when Smith called Neel for assistance researching her ancestry in Randolph County, Mo. They didn’t know each other; a local genealogist recommended Neel to Smith because of her work researching slaveholding families in the area.

Neel, who is white, is professor emerita of comparative sociology and women’s studies at the University of Puget Sound. She continues to teach courses on race, slavery and gender at colleges near her California home. Smith lives in Chicago, where she is a communications consultant in the nonprofit sector and has worked in politics and government, including serving as communications director for President Barack Obama’s U.S. Senate primary campaign and Jesse Jackson’s 1988 presidential campaign.

Both women had roots in Randolph County and a friendship grew between them as they exchanged ideas, resources and frustrations in their respective searches. This relationship was soon tested, however, by the discovery that their shared narrative began long before that initial phone conversation: One of Neel’s ancestors once owned Smith’s great-great grandfather in Missouri.

“Recovering from our initial shock and dismay, we developed a public presentation to share with others about how our own ancestors’ histories — like those of all Americans — are particular versions of the tragic racial history of this country,” Smith and Neel wrote in a description of “Entangled Lives.”

“We try to demonstrate how racial reconciliation and genuine friendship in the present becomes possible when honest communication about the pain of the past is accompanied by large doses of care, tenacity, courage and humor.”

They use photographs, historical documents and their own correspondence to explore their personal connections to slavery, its legacy, and its ramifications for all Americans.

The two women also follow a historical trail that traces their connection back even further than their Missouri roots, to Albemarle County, Va. They found they are “blood relatives,” reaching back some 10 generations, to Major John Lewis. Lewis was a Welsh immigrant related by marriage to a household thought to have included four of the 20 Africans listed in the first Virginia census around 1623.

The event is free and open to the public. For more information, email kmunn@sbc.edu or call (434) 381-6103.

Contact: Jennifer McManamay