Storytelling and Preservation at Horton Grove

Gerald Jaime Reiling is a Program II major in Urban Planning and Design in the class of 2028 and a featured guest blogger. Gerald was a student in our human rights seminar course, Memory Bandits, in fall 2025. This seminar introduced students to multiple approaches to why and how to create memory, with a focus on contributing to a project underway at Catawba Trail Farm. Several students will be featured guest bloggers on the Duke Human Rights Blog this month as part of our Student Stories: Memory Bandits Series. 

When I first visited Horton Grove, I was struck by the landscape's immense beauty. In Northern Durham, as far from campus as I’ve gone from Duke University, it felt like a different world. From the shades of green, yellow, and red on the trees to how the sun shone through the forest, it was a beautiful trail.

However, beneath this beauty lies a history of oppression and pain. Horton Grove was once part of Stagville, the largest plantation in North Carolina. In one section stands a row of dwellings made by enslaved people for their families. I could not help but think of how this land was once worked by enslaved people and, later, sharecroppers. After the Civil War, sharecropping became the dominant system in Stagville. In sharecropping, a landowner rents land to tenants who farm in exchange for a share of the crop. High interest rates, unpredictable harvests, and exploitative deals, however, kept many families, White and Black, from making a living. Many were trapped for decades or even generations in the sharecropping system.

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Historical records estimate that around 700 emancipated African Americans (half of the total enslaved population) stayed at Stagville to work as sharecroppers after the Civil War. Sharecropping remained in Stagville throughout the late 19th century and into the early 20th century, only fading in the 1940s with the rise of mechanized farming. Between the beautiful landscape and complex history, I found myself wondering: What does it mean for a space to be so naturally beautiful, and yet so historically pained? How can we acknowledge both realities?

This is the contradiction that a memory bandit inhabits. As Jacob Dlamini, a historian of South African Apartheid, describes it, “memory bandits are activists, archivists, scholars fighting against systems that want to be done with the past.” Within Horton Grove, we already see this work in play. The preservation of the former dwellings of enslaved people serves as a permanent reminder of the site’s history. Proof that history is not something distant or forgotten, but something that continues to occupy space and create impact in our present. Furthermore, the trail I walked was the Holman Loop, named after one of the enslaved families who once worked in Stagville, reminding visitors of the history beneath the scenic views. 

Through direct preservation and creative storytelling, spaces like Horton Grove can be appreciated for their beauty while still acknowledging their histories. My own work with the Catawba Trail Farms builds upon this foundation. Through my interviews with former sharecroppers and descendants, I’ve come to understand sharecropping in Stagville as not only an oppressive system of labor but also the backdrop for everyday life. During the sharecropping era, families built community, children played along streams searching for arrowheads, and people found meaning despite their difficult circumstances. Through my oral histories, I hope to illuminate the lives of sharecroppers by centering their voices and experiences, preserving not only their structures but the memories and stories attached to them.