On Stewardship, Legacy, and Bells
On August 4, 2023, Christian and Hellen Haller commissioned a set of bells for the University of Chicago bearing the names of major contributors to society. Dr. Georgiana R. Simpson was honored as one of those contributors. When I received an invite to the dedication ceremony, I was referred to as a steward of Dr. Simpson’s legacy. This particular phrase struck me and I began to meditate on what it means to be a good steward and the value of a legacy.
To steward is to manage and look after someone else’s property. But what does it mean to steward a legacy? A legacy is “the long-lasting impact of particular events, actions, etc. that took place in the past or of a person’s life.” Dr. Simpson was discriminated against, possibly humiliated, and forced to live a life with limited freedoms. Being a black woman in the midst of the Great Migration in Chicago meant that she was always running up against resistance at every turn. It’s been almost 5 years since I co-commissioned the monument of Dr. Simpson. I often think about whether she ever contemplated her own legacy. It's common to not really think of your legacy until you've progressed in age or have reason to believe the end is here. Dr. Simpson never married nor did she have children. She died suddenly in 1944. It’s impossible to know what Dr. Simpson would have thought about her legacy.
Legacy is a concept that has been on my mind all summer. On June 29, 2023; the Supreme Court decided to effectively end the use of affirmative action in college admissions decisions. So much undue attention has been placed on historically disadvantaged students that little attention, until after the Supreme Court decision, was spent on legacy admissions. Students of color, more specifically black students, make up a smaller percentage of admitted students than, for example, legacy students (at least in my current institution). Legacy admissions took root in America around the time Dr. Simpson was earning her Ph.D. in 1919. Ivy League institutions gave preferential treatment to children of alumni in the admissions process and over time this category of privilege expanded to the students of staff and major donors. Legacy admissions were just as equally about exclusion as inclusion. As immigration laws were shifting in this part of the twentieth century, many institutions were keen to keep out those deemed "foreign" to the American ideal.
In the case of legacy students, one inherits the privilege, position, name, and good standing of the ones who came before them by virtue of birth. The legacy of Dr. Simpson is quite different. I don’t have to be born of her, a genetic descendant, to benefit from her legacy. Instead, I inherited a set of privileges and access to institutions, based on the lack of access and privileges that Dr. Simpson had at the time. I inherit a world a particular style and a way of living by virtue of the way Dr. Simpson lived hers–defiantly and without remorse. While black students by no means are free from discrimination and hardships in higher education, we inherit the accumulation of long-fought freedoms that are now under attack.
60 years ago during his “I Have A Dream Speech” in Washington DC, Dr. Martin Luther King pronounced “Let Freedom Ring” in every corner of America. The word “let” suggests that there is always going to be something preventing freedom from having its way. In fact, freedom is something that needs to be allowed, it’s a natural dispensation of the human heart–to be free. Towards the end of his speech, Dr. King said that it’s only when we allow freedom to ring that we will all have the benefit of saying “We are free at last.” What does this mean? When I think of the new bell dedicated to Dr. Simpson’s honor, I realize that when one allows the bell to do what it does best –ring, we will all hear and benefit from the resounding sound.
