{"id":18455,"date":"2020-10-31T12:47:00","date_gmt":"2020-10-31T16:47:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/?p=18455"},"modified":"2020-11-01T10:01:39","modified_gmt":"2020-11-01T15:01:39","slug":"bill-franson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/2020\/10\/31\/bill-franson\/","title":{"rendered":"What Photographer Bill Franson Found Along The Mason-Dixon Line"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 2015, Newbury photographer Bill Franson set out in search of the Mason-Dixon line\u2014the the legendary boundary between America\u2019s North and South, between the Civil War\u2019s free and slave states.<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s an actual line too, laid out by astronomer Charles Mason and surveyor Jeremiah Dixon in the 1760s to resolve a border dispute between the British colonies of Maryland, Pennsylvania and Delaware. Eventually, Franson writes, \u201cat every mile a granite stone was placed on the line, every fifth mile a \u2018crown stone\u2019 with Penn and Calvert family crests on opposite sides.\u201d<\/p>\n

Today, the markers cut across farms and coal country, suburbs and factory towns. Franson went looking for them in \u201can attempt to touch history, and simply look around and see,\u201d he told the Griffin Museum of Photography<\/a> in May.<\/p>\n

His 37 black and white gelatin silver photos in his exhibition \u201cMason Dixon: American Fictions\u201d at Boston\u2019s Gallery Kayafas<\/a>, from Oct. 23 to Nov. 28, show what he found over five years of exploring.<\/p>\n

\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Garret Road, Manchester, MD. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Franson, who teaches at Gordon College in Wenham, \u201cdiscovered that many of them [the markers] were on private property. Others I heard were pulled out of cultivated fields, or dislodged for use as a cornerstone or doorstep, and noted that those on a roadside were fenced in, contextualizing their presence.\u201d<\/p>\n

Roads rarely followed the line. He writes in an artist statement: \u201cConsequently, I found myself spinning circles above and below the line, pulled north or south by curious town names, sniffing the wind for revelatory suggestions of original intent, evidence of human fortune, tragedy, time past and a present place.\u201d<\/p>\n

Franson found cigar-store Indians and a tire swing suspended from a tree and a trailer park and vacant storefronts along sun-bleached main streets. He found Civil War monuments and praise for Jesus and gun shops and American flags.<\/p>\n

\n

If this is the kind of coverage of arts, cultures and activisms you appreciate, please support Wonderland by contributing to Wonderland on Patreon<\/a>. And sign up for our free, (hopefully) weekly newsletter<\/a> so that you don’t miss any of our reporting. (All content \u00a9Greg Cook 2020 or the respective creators.)<\/em><\/p>\n

\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Peachbottom, PA, 2019. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Oxford, PA, 2019. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Mardela Springs, MD, 2016. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Mary, Port Deposit, PA, 2015. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Jesus Loves You, Off Route 14, WV, 2015. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Jackson and Lee Pedestal, Harriet Tubman Grove, Baltimore, MD, 2017. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Gettysburg, PA, 2016. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Frostburg, MD, 2017. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Fayette City, PA, 2017. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Karen, Marydel, MD-DE, 2018. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, American Spirit, Waynesboro, PA, 2016. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Hebron, MD, 2018. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, Quantico, MD, 2018. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bill<\/a>
Bill Franson, No Public Restroom, Sale Are Final, 2019. (Courtesy Gallery Kayafas)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 2015, Newbury photographer Bill Franson set out in search of the Mason-Dixon line\u2014the the legendary boundary between America\u2019s North and South, between the Civil War\u2019s free and slave states. But it\u2019s an actual line too, laid out by astronomer Charles Mason and surveyor Jeremiah Dixon in the 1760s to resolve a border dispute between […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18490,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[100],"tags":[416,176],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18455"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18455"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18455\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18526,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18455\/revisions\/18526"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}