A Mural for an Enslaved Man - Fortune

Mural
Written By John Mills

Mattatuck Museum administrators viewing Fortune as his body hangs on display circa 1960

As you may already know, The Alex Breanne Corporation has been working to install a mural in Waterbury Connecticut in honor of “The Man Fortune“. Fortune was an 18th century enslaved man who’s body was used for medical science and profit for centuries after his death . Fortune’s bones would not be buried until 2013, which was 215 years after his death.

Our mural steering committee includes individuals from:

  • Connecticut State Historic Preservation Office

  • Silas Bronson Library

  • St. John's Episcopal Church

  • Riverside Cemetery

  • Waterbury Public Schools

  • NAACP, Waterbury Chapter

  • Connecticut Freedom Trail

  • Waterbury Arts & Tourism Commission

  • Waterbury, CT Mayor’s Office

The RiseUP Group is managing the effort. Alex Breanne Corporation is donating $10k to the effort. Alex Toussaint’s Do Better Foundation has committed $5k towards the effort. Also, the Peloton Community Group Feel Good Family is working to contribute another $2k. We expect the total cost of the project to be roughly $25k, so we are working on ways to raise the additional $8k.

We are hoping for mural completion in Spring or Summer of 2024. We identified 8 potential locations and have narrowed it down to 4 ideal wall locations. We are now validating each (public or private, contacting owners, etc.). We are also working on community feedback into the effort to include Waterbury public schools.

The above image depicts Mattatuck Museum administrators inquisitively admiring Fortune as his body hangs on display circa 1960. I've intentionally cropped Fortune out of the image, because the next time you see an image of Fortune, I would like it to be in honor of him while living, not while being used in death. I would like your memory of him to be within a larger than life depiction, towering within the city where he lived, was enslaved and died.

Please consider supporting our effort by helping us meet our fund raising goal. You can donate at https://alexbreanne.org/donate.

Thank you and God Bless.

John Mills

Originally from San Diego, John Mills is a technologist by trade, but an equity advocate and independent scholar by passion. The descendant of both southern and northern enslaved, John focuses on unearthing little known people and stories of this country’s history in slavery and the transatlantic slave trade. John presents research through the lens and perspective of a descendant, with intent to inspire understanding and empathy, a means to inspire good, God fearing people, now armed with information, to look into whether they may be unwittingly aligning to biases resulting from the reverberating effects of a past time. John is a member of the Connecticut Freedom Trail and a member of the Webb Deane Stevens Museum Council. John is also working with an international team funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) in an effort to deliver transformational impact on digital methods in cultural institutions...a means to decolonize museums. Finally, John is working with the state of Connecticut, business leaders and scholars in Middletown, CT to honor and memorialize a former enslaved individual by the name of Prince Mortimer.

https://alexbreanne.org
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