The university began the process of reconciliation with its past, acknowledging people who were, in effect, made invisible, said Jody Allen, an assistant professor of history at William & Mary. “They’re coming out of the shadows,” Allen said. “We’re establishing a place on campus where they will always be remembered.”

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It’s not just William & Mary confronting a painful chapter in its institutional history; a growing number of schools throughout the country, and even overseas, are delving into the role slavery played.

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People are increasingly rejecting the idea that slavery can stay in the shadows as part of the forgotten past, said Allen, director of the Lemon Project, a research effort named for a man who was enslaved by the college, “as we come to accept the reality that the financial, economic foundation of this country was built on slavery.”

“I don’t think this is going to die out anytime soon,” Allen said. “I think it’s going to get bigger.”

At William & Mary, students pushed for a critical examination of the school’s history in 2007, and called for a memorial to people who had been enslaved there. In 2009, college officials created the Lemon Project. Last year, school officials launched an international design contest and received more than 80 entries.

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“Hearth,” the winning entry, was designed by William Sendor, who graduated from the school in 2011 and is working at an architecture firm in North Carolina.

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He immediately wanted to enter the contest, knowing the impact a memorial could have, Sendor said. But he said it was the most difficult design challenge he has faced.

While researching the history of slavery in Virginia and on the campus, and seeing drawings and depictions of that time, he read a book by a woman who earned her doctorate at William & Mary, Jennifer Oast, and was struck by her descriptions of the role of fire in the enslaved community. Then he “pieced together the idea of the fireplace, the hearth, that seemed to bind the enslaved people in their toil and their struggle and yet seemed also to bind them together as family and community.”

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Sendor knew the idea could be powerful — “It just got my heart beating, thinking about this concept,” he said — and worked to hone it. The idea of illumination inspired him, he said: “To figuratively illuminate the forgotten history and memory of these enslaved people who sacrificed and contributed immeasurably to William & Mary for over half of the College’s history, and then to physically illuminate a shared space for community gathering and reflection for generations to come.”

The choice of material was evocative as well. Bricks are emblematic of William & Mary’s historic campus, he said — and enslaved people fired many of the bricks there.

Enslaved people labored in many ways on campus, Allen said: cooking, cleaning, gardening, building, painting, repairing, tending to animals in the stables, keeping fresh water in students’ rooms, cleaning boots and shoes — and tending to the fires, keeping the fires burning.

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“The hearth is an ancient, powerful symbol of home, of community, and of belonging,” Rowe, the college’s president, said in a written statement. “The exploited labor of enslaved African Americans helped create William & Mary, and this memorial concept will unequivocally recognize their lasting contributions to this institution, with humility, gratitude and conscience.”

Some bricks will be inscribed with names of enslaved people, with the expectation that more names will be added as research continues. The college knows the names of about 60 enslaved people, Allen said.

More than $150,000 has been raised for the project, and the board of visitors has pledged to match all gifts. The school does not have a timeline for completing the memorial but expects to launch the next phase quickly.