After five years, the “Sowing the Seeds of the Future” statute honoring a trio of women who lived and worked near the Nikwasi Mound in Franklin in the 1800s is getting closer to being unveiled.
“The sculpture was finished at 6 o’clock on Friday, May 12,” Mary Polanski, co-chair of the Women’s History Trail, said.
Polanski, her husband Stan, Marty Greeble and Claire Suminski visited the foundry in Texas where the final work on the statue was done. She said they were “speechless and breathless” when seeing the completed work.
“This was an opportunity of a lifetime,” said Greeble. “Seeing the sculpture in the foundry left me speechless and teary-eyed. The diversity of the women in this monumental piece of public art is so meaningful to the message of our project. I am in awe of Wesley Wofford’s artistry. The sculpture is absolutely magnificent.”
The sculpture, “Sowing the Seeds of the Future,” depicts three women, and two children, from three different backgrounds, all of whom are connected by the land near the Nikwasi Mound in what is now Franklin.
The next step will be getting the “pocket park” in the area between East and NE Main Street, near the town bridge, ready for the sculpture’s arrival, which could happen as soon as this fall.
Mary said the park will be a continuation of the Little Tennessee River Greenway and said it will be accessible to all. Mainspring Conservation Trust owns the land and is working to get a beautification grant for the area.
Polanski said the Women’s History Trail and the Town of Franklin just received the initial land concept from local landscaper Richard Park. The plan also includes Duke Energy moving power poles from the property.
Polanski said Ken Murphy, Phil Drake, Mary and Kendra Rashce, plus numerous businesses and volunteers, will be honored.
Wesley Wofford of Cashiers created the statue. The statue is the vision of the late Barbara McRae, who wanted to uplift women and teach locals about the history of the area.
“Those early donors had faith in Barbara [McRae’s] vision,” Stan Polanski said.
The statue is the work of the Women’s History Trail, a project of the Folk Heritage Association of Macon County. The Women’s History Trail, centered in downtown Franklin, consists of 15 markers (and likely more to come) honoring individuals and groups of women who made a difference in the lives of those in Macon County. The statue will aim to serve as a trailhead for the Women’s History Trail.
Mary and Stan Polanski said they hope it revitalizes the area near the Little Tennessee River Greenway, transforming the small space into an “urban oasis.”
Three women connected by a piece of land
One of the women, Na’ha Rebecca Morris, was a Cherokee woman who married Gideon Morris, a white Baptist preacher from South Carolina. In 1819, Gideon Morris acquired 640 acres of what is modern-day east Franklin, mostly on the east side of the Little Tennessee River. The homestead was near the Nikwasi Mound, the spiritual heart of the Cherokee Indians of the region.
“Part of the reason Rebecca and her husband Gideon wanted this reserve was because of its proximity to this very spiritual site,” Mary Polanski said during an interview at FROG Quarters, located across from the future site of the pocket park.
She said Gideon became an advocate for the Cherokee’s property rights in the area before the forced removal by the U.S. government in the 1830s.
The second woman in the statue was born around the same time as Na’ha Rebecca Morris, according to Polanski. This woman, only known as Sally, was a Black slave owned by Na’ha’s Cherokee family.
“That relationship, when [Na’ha] married Gideon, the likelihood of her being with Rebecca in that transition to this land, there’s a good likelihood of that,” Polanski said. “The interesting thing about Sally is that she likely spoke Cherokee well…she had much to offer.”
However, the Morris household was burned down in 1820 by Robert Love and the Love family then took over the property.
Eventually, Sally was sold to Jessie Siler, whose family had bought the former Morris settlement from the Love family.
Polanski said they’re not sure about the circumstances regarding the sale of Sally, but Mary said Barbara McRae’s theory was that the Siler family needed Sally due to her knowledge of the Cherokee language and agriculture and the Morris family was moving on.
Jesse Siler had a daughter, Timoxena Siler Sloan, the third woman depicted in the statue. Timoxena lived on the same 640 acres, a wedding gift from her father, with Sally as her slave.
“This piece of property had these three women who were bridged by Sally the slave who lived in both of their households,” Stan Polanski said. “The idea of the sculpture is to honor the daily lives of these women, what they did in their households, and what they did for the community. From three different cultures and lived right where the sculpture’s going to be.”
Timoxena Siler Sloan lived on the land through the 1870s, as did Sally, who is documented as staying even after emancipation in 1865.
“Timoxena, she was widowed at age 40 with six kids to raise,” Mary said. “Think about that in the 1800s. Apparently, a very strong, upbeat and exuberant person, because the Silers kept really good records….But in the end, the women and the work they did to keep the families healthy. The women and their strength in the story have kind of been the undercurrent. And that sculpture is going to give people a little curiosity. Some of the cultural issues were the way they interacted. Some of those things persist right now with us.”
Before the statue’s much-anticipated arrival, the Women’s History Trail is still raising funds for the project. Mary said the project’s length now requires a “little bit of a buffer” monetarily to bridge the gap to installation. You can donate to The Women’s History Trail at folkheritageassociation.org under the “Women’s History Trail” tab.
On July 17, a program at Cowee School Arts & Heritage Center will bring the three women to life through a program with actresses giving monologues about their lives and their importance to their families and the community. The program will be part of the “Where We Live: History, Nature and Culture” lecture series and will begin at 6:30 p.m.