--- title: A Rooted Return date: 2022-02-01T05:30:00-05:00 author: University of Maryland canonical_url: "https://today.umd.edu/a-rooted-return" section: Articles --- # A Rooted Return *February 1, 2022* — by [Sala Levin ’10](/author/sala-levin-10) > Generations After Her Ancestor Was Enslaved in Prince George’s, Grad Student Reinvigorates Area’s Agricultural and Communal Ties *Drakeford S Cordle 1920x1080 2 — A great-great-great-grandfather of Brittney Drakeford, a Ph.D. candidate in urban and regional planning and design, was enslaved on a plantation in present-day Capitol Heights. Now a planner for the county, Drakeford is imagining new ways that Prince Georgians can connect with the land on which many of their ancestors suffered.* **IN 1902,** Robert Harrod Sr. signed the deed to own land in the very county where he had spent the beginning of his life legally owned and enslaved. He bought 13 acres near present-day FedEx Field, which he farmed throughout his life, then divided into smaller parcels for each of his five children. Their legacy was cut off in the 1970s, however, when the state and Prince George’s County took ownership of the land as the result of unpaid property taxes. Brittney Drakeford, a doctoral student in UMD’s School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, grew up in the county and recalls accompanying her mother and grandmother on drives where they’d pass a particular stretch of land, vacant and wild. They’d always point out that it had once belonged to Brittney’s great-great-great-grandfather. *1940 Prince George’s County map* --- *House on the Concord plantation, seen here in 1936* *1902 deed documenting the sale of land from Mary Sheriff to Robert Harrod Sr.* --- **AT THE END** of a quiet residential street in Cottage City, Md., past the brick town hall on a lot near the Anacostia River, Drakeford is at home in more than one sense. She wends her way through the community garden, its plants laden with cherry tomatoes, eggplants and peppers, pointing out the new irrigation system, the Concord grapevines, the beehives in the back. Some of the Cottage City gardeners are part of the seed-saving movement, in which native plants are preserved by passing their seeds on to future generations. The indigenous peanuts, peas and sweet potatoes growing in the garden have evolved to thrive in the acidity of the local soil, the sun exposure and the weather. Like those plants, Drakeford knows how to bloom in the land she’s planted in. “There are these environmental factors that make it easier for me, because of that familiarity, to navigate in this environment.” When she struggled in school, she’d drop in at her aunt’s house for a home-cooked dinner. When she needs advice today, she visits her dad down the street. Drakeford was a senior in high school in 2004 when her mother, Sharon, died of pulmonary sarcoidosis, a rare lung disease resulting from the body’s immune response. The root cause is unknown, but research suggests that the triggers could be fungi, chemicals, dust, bacteria or viruses. The Cleveland Clinic reports that African Americans are four to 17 times more likely to develop the disease than white people and are more likely to have a severe form. Drakeford believes her mom’s case “was probably because of the neighborhood where she grew up, the impacts of residential segregation and the trauma of displacement,” she says. Her mother’s death sparked Drakeford’s interest in her family history, which she continued researching as an undergraduate studying journalism and African American history at North Carolina A&T State University in Greensboro, and in her graduate and professional work. It was in college that Drakeford began to realize her interest in place and people. When a fellow student complained that Greensboro was boring, Drakeford balked. She thought that was impossible in any city, with all its residents and their stories bouncing up against one another in parks, offices, coffee shops and homes—and she was determined to prove it. She began exploring Greensboro, “just sitting back, watching, learning, listening and then saying, ‘Okay, well, what can I do?’” She began volunteering at the African American Atelier, an art gallery that she’d stumbled upon one day while walking downtown. Eventually, she became a youth director and curator, organizing exhibits focusing on women living in poverty or young, up-and-coming artists. “I started to realize that how we designed an exhibit … forced people to have certain types of internal reflections and certain types of internal conversations, and it also forced these external conversations,” Drakeford says. It was an early revelation that the physical environment shaped relationships. After earning a master’s degree in management at Wake Forest University, Drakeford returned to Maryland and began working for the [Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission](https://www.mncppc.org/) (MNCPPC), which governs land-use planning in Montgomery and Prince George’s counties. She learned the nuances of zoning ordinances and started a doctoral program in urban and regional planning and design at UMD. “I’ve learned things (from Drakeford) that I wasn’t necessarily able to see from academe and from a researcher’s perspective, in terms of … the bureaucracy of the process of planning,” says Marccus Hendricks, Drakeford’s adviser and assistant professor in the School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation. “She is a sponge in terms of soaking up as much information and knowledge as she possibly can, and really driven to really support communities in a way that they see fit.” --- *Train tracks run directly behind the Cottage City Community Garden that Drakeford co-manages.* *Woman works in garden* --- **AT SOME POINT** during the pandemic, as she was preparing for her comprehensive exams, Drakeford spent the better part of a month crying. Her uncle had recently died, and there was talk of selling the church where her great-great-grandparents were buried. She felt powerless. “I have perceived power” because of her position in county government, she says, but “I don’t have enough power to save my family, in a sense.” In person, Drakeford is buoyant and talkative, willing to give generously of herself and her time. And yet, she admits, “I’m exhausted.” She feels the trauma her long-ago ancestors experienced on this land, and newer trauma, too. Her father, she says, was pulled over by county police when he was a teenager, accused of robbing a store he’d never been to and put in the back of the police car. Though he wasn’t physically harmed, Drakeford says the moment was “a very pronounced incident” in his relationship with the county he grew up in. On her [personal website](https://brittneythenerd.com/), Drakeford muses about how Black people must look both forward and backward in shaping their lives. “If you’ve sat in a conversation with me for more than 30 minutes, at some point I’ve probably drifted into some ideas of Afro-futurism; Black people planning their future and preserving their history as radical acts of time travel and time reclamation.” She plans and builds, believing that doing so can take back some of what was lost. Drakeford’s father and his sisters own a parcel of inherited property in South Carolina, where she’s leading the family in creating a land trust to preserve it permanently. At 15 acres, it’s a little more than the farmland her great-great-great-grandfather bought for himself and his descendants. She hopes one day they’ll start a family farm there—a loop connecting past and future, a harkening to what came before and a stake in what is still to come. **Sidebar note:** This is one of a series of Maryland Today features during Black History Month celebrating Terp faculty, staff, students and alums. --- **Sidebar note:** This story is featured in the Winter 2022 issue of *Terp* magazine. Find all the stories online at [terp.umd.edu](https://terp.umd.edu/). **Topics:** [People](https://today.umd.edu/tags/people) **Tags:** [Urban Studies and Planning](https://today.umd.edu/topic/urban-studies-and-planning), [Black History Month](https://today.umd.edu/topic/black-history-month) **Units:** [School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation](https://today.umd.edu/topic/school-architecture-planning-and-preservation)