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Men and Mules: Convict Leasing in Quarries of the New South
The convict leasing system devised to support the industrialization of the New South was an extension of slavery that continues in our present mass incarceration crisis. I am currently producing a shortvideo using puppets to depict the lives of convicts who worked in Atlanta area quarries for display in the Hapeville Depot Museum. The soundtrack employs “Mule on the Mount” collected by Zora Neale Hurston to illustrate how the treatment of convicts leased to quarries compared unfavorably with the treatment of draft animals employed in quarry operations.
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