Athaliah Elvis ’26, BHC Communications Intern
On Friday, March 27, Bucknell’s Assistant Professor of English-Literary Studies, Affiliated Faculty in Critical Black Studies and event Programming Fellow, Kenton Butcher, moderated a family-style conversation with Dave Butcher, the founder and director of the Tablertown, OH, People of Color Museum. Yes, you saw the name twice, Dr. Butcher and Dr. Butcher, as in the two are nephew and uncle. The two united in a heartfelt dialogue about their family’s ancestry being a primal point of their research and work in Appalachian studies.
Audiences gathered around in true family-style fashion as David, or Uncle Dave, began his story. It all started when he was only ten years old, living in a rural southeast Ohio community called Tablertown, David Butcher received a tin-type photo of his great-great-grandfather, Jerry Sims. He’d grown up hearing stories about Mr. Sims was a Civil War veteran, but hadn’t realized the important power in knowing where his family came from. From that moment forward, Butcher was inspired to learn more about his family lineage in order to preserve his community’s history and culture. On this journey, he not only learned of an ancestry dating back to slavery, with his aunt being an enslaved woman named Hannah, but that her partner was of German ancestry, leading to a heartfelt reconnection from a phone call with a Washington D.C. area code. This cousin was able to join them today as an audience member, showing photos from their first time meeting in person.
In 2003, Butcher would then go on to curate an exhibit on Black life in the Ohio River Valley for the Kennedy Museum of Art at Ohio University. Despite the joint efforts between the Tablertown community and the university, the Butchers duly noted there are often conflicts due to the university’s occupation on the land and their hand in privatizing spaces, resources and history. With the popularity of the exhibit, Butcher established the Tablertown People of Color Museum in a pole barn next to his home. Since then, he has established a 501(c)3, developed plans to build a new museum in Tablertown and received numerous awards for his work, most recently earning his honorary doctorate from Ohio University in 2024.
This program is part of the BHC Theme Year Programming Series, “Black Appalachia and the Search for Nowhere,” scholars are invited to present their research on Black life and culture in the Appalachian region, bringing fugitivity and marronage into conversation with Black Appalachian studies.
