Legacy Of Grace

Who was this man who made the choice to employ kindness, generosity and compassion in response to a world filled with hatred and terrorism toward people of color, over a hundred years ago? What possessed him? Was he doing for others what he was never able to do for his own enslaved mother? She was brutally stolen from him by his own father when he was but four years old. When he created the Poor Widow’s Fund was he returning symbolically to the “wounded place” Alice Walker referred to when she wrote, “Healing begins where the wound was made?” Who was this man who made sure that the widows of Yellow Springs received a Christmas gift each year? We know he was a formerly enslaved Black man. But that fact cannot define the man nor tell us who he was both in and out of slavery. How he lived, what obstacles he overcame and what motivated him to achieve became driving questions for me. Who was he really? What was his journey like? How did he end up in Yellow Springs? How did African Americans live at this time in history? What motivated, inspired and empowered him to achieve such a legacy of grace? I couldn’t stop wondering about him and set about to find some answers. In the course of the next seven years I came to understand more about Mr Gaunt’s life and times. I also gained a greater understanding about the TRUE story of the founding and building of America. This is a story that I knew next to nothing about. It wasn’t taught in the history books I read or the schools I attended. The life of Wheeling Gaunt encompassed a complex and multifaceted identity. His creation resulted from the melding of two very different cultures and ancestry being both African and European. He was the son, as well as slave, of a white slave master/father and a Black enslaved mother; a four year old boy whose mother was stolen from him; a brother who throughout his life helped to raise and care for his sister, Louisa and later her family; an uncle to Louisa’s daughter Amanda who was plagued with mental illness (likely named for his own wife Amanda). In addition, he assisted hi niece Amanda’s husband was disabled after his military service in the Civil War; a half brother to six white brothers and a sister, only three of whom survived into adulthood; a man who was enslaved for over one-third of his life to his own privileged white “family.” At a time when traditional marriage arrangements were made difficult if not illegal for Blacks, he was a devoted family man who was married for over thirty years to Amanda, until her death. He was a father to at least one child who predeceased him —a boy named Nicholas; At various times he was likely a house slave and field slave, a laborer, teamster, carpenter, seller of apples and a boot black. Eventually he was a freed man and it is also likely he was a resistance fighter on the Underground Railroad providing a safe house for escaping people; Assuredly, he was a savvy businessman and real estate investor; and a husband, again after his first wife’s death to Elizabeth who cared for him in his final days; He was a member of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, in particular Central Chapel in Yellow Springs and a celebrity in the newspapers whose finances were the fodder of much speculation and gossip. He was a friend or acquaintance purported to have known many impressive people of the period including Frederick Douglass, W.E.B Du Bois, Bishop Daniel A. Payne, Bishop James A. Shorter and Dr. John G Mitchell; and lastly, he was acknowledged as a “benefactor to his race” when he gifted Wilberforce University with a sizable bequest. He was a man who believed in freedom and justice and devoted his life to helping others achieve dignity. On a personal level we can infer that he was socially adept, hard working, intelligent and a strategic thinker— A man whom, against all odds, earned enough money to purchase his own manumission as well as his wife’s, another young man’s whom some speculate was his son. He was diligent and disciplined, saving money over years and years of effort. He was also a man of principle who put the welfare of others ahead of his own. A man of courage, at age fifty-two, he moved with his wife, Amanda, from Carrollton, Kentucky to Yellow Springs, over one hundred and forty-four miles away, as the Civil War raged on. He was civic minded and ran for the school board after the Village integrated its schools. Toward the end of his life he was lauded in newspapers throughout Ohio and Indiana as “the richest colored man in Ohio.” He left sizable bequests to Wilberforce University and the Village of Yellow Springs as well as providing for his family, church and friends. In the final analysis, he fared far better financially than either of his two privileged white half brothers. At his death his estate was worth considerably more than was theirs. He also outlived both half brothers. He did all this while living in a harshly racist and oppressive country and being enslaved for over one-third of his life. He accomplished all of this without any formal education that we know of, only learning to read and write in the later part of his life. Today, he is the subject of veneration in his community. Wheeling Gaunt lived for eighty-two years. The study of his life and world tells us about a time in the relatively recent past when humans bought and sold other humans and when our country flourished economically by figuratively and sometimes even literally standing on the backs of a race of people. He is an example of how one Black man made his way in the world while setting a standard for accomplishment and service that is instructive and still to be admired, even to be emulated. What motivated, inspired and empowered him to achieve such a legacy of grace? I couldn’t stop wondering about him and set about to find some answers.