Blackwell School Museum and the Politics of Tears in Marfa

Mary Walling Blackburn's essay examines the Blackwell School Museum and Community Center in Marfa, Texas, a former segregation-era school for Latino children (1889-1964) that opened as a museum in 2007. The museum is situated in a town dominated by the Chinati Foundation and Judd Foundation, yet remains the least visited attraction. Blackburn contrasts the museum with the fictional Museum of Useless Efforts from Cristina Peri Rossi's novel, exploring themes of loss, memory, and resistance. She details the Blackwell Reunion Committee's efforts to reclaim history, including the symbolic disinterment of 'Mr Spanish'—a 1954 burial of Spanish language under the flagpole—re-enacted in 2007 with a child-size coffin containing a Spanish-English dictionary. The essay highlights the ongoing border patrol presence, water politics, and the legacy of segregation, including the 1965 forced integration where students carried desks to the white school. Blackburn draws on Eduardo Cadava's concept of a 'politics of tears' to describe the community's struggle, and references the story of Lucia Rede Madrid's library in Redford, where Mexican children crossed the Rio Grande to borrow books. The essay was published by Afterall on November 5, 2008.