Storyteller shares ‘Legacy of a Wealthy Slave’ at Center on Main

FALLS VILLAGE – Connecticut storyteller Denise Manning Keyes Page spoke at the Center on Main on Saturday, June 20, engaging an audience with the first two parts of her trilogy, “Legacy of a Wealthy Slave,” which traces her journey to learn about her ancestors and family history.

Page described herself as a storyteller, which she said is different from writing a memoir or delivering a lecture. Storytelling is performance, she said, and brings information to life.

In that spirit, she opened with the first installment of her trilogy, Midnight Mariah, assuming the voice of her late mother, Dorothy, and transporting the audience to a small, dark room in 1927.

As a young girl, Dorothy lay awake, frightened. Her mother – Page’s grandmother – was battling breast cancer, and Dorothy listened for the sound of her breathing, just to know she was still alive.

Then a train that regularly passed through at night, known to Dorothy as “Midnight Mariah,” approached.

The beds began to rock and sway, a big bright light filled the dark room, and the train’s horn pierced the darkness.

“Mommy, did you hear her?” she asked.

“Yes, Dorothy,” her mother replied weakly. “Now you must get some sleep.”

The story served as more than a childhood memory of her mother’s. It also illustrated how little Dorothy knew about earlier generations of her family, in particular her great-great grandfather, Alfred C. Manning, who had been enslaved in North Carolina and worked as a ship carpenter before the Civil War.

According to Page, Manning eventually purchased his freedom and moved to New Haven, where she said he secured a patent for a device used to dock ships. His invention was successful, and he sent two of his sons to Yale University.

Page said she spent decades asking her mother for stories about the family. It was only at the end of Dorothy’s life that she mentioned an uncle and an aunt.

Page recalled that in 2002, she was seized by a sudden urge to go visit her mother and try once again to glean information about her ancestors.

Page attributed this urge to what she called “the Divine Whisperer.”

During that visit, Dorothy mentioned “my father’s brother and sister.”

“All my life she told me her father was an only child,” Page said.

She theorized that Dorothy had suffered a childhood trauma that led to memory loss or suppressing part of the family’s history.

The second part of the performance, The Archivist’s Gift, begins in 2024 when Charles “Chaz” Warner Jr. of Yale contacted Page with information about the Manning family in Edenton, North Carolina.

At long last, she said, pieces of the puzzle began to fall into place.

Research revealed that there were three Mannings at Yale: John Wesley Manning, Class of 1881; Henry Edward Manning, Class of 1880; and William Edwin Manning, Class of 1915.

The story is not complete, Page said, leaving audience members wanting to learn more. Part three about Alfred Manning is still in progress.

But Page’s theme is consistent. “It’s not about the longing to be free of trauma,” she said. “It’s about the longing to be free to be.”