The preservation process for the Owen and Thomas House had two approaches for the two separate lives that live there. The main house was cleaned up and redone to make it look brand new again once Telfair Museum acquired the home. They put a lot of money into reworking the outside Gardens and making it look as pretty as it does. Complete with an abundance of greenery plant life, fixing the Cobblestone pathways and making it a picturesque area. The carriage house's top floor is now an area for the historians of the Owens-Thomas House. They do a lot of their research and studying of life in Savannah. The upper, middle, and lower class. The preservation process for the main house went like how it does in most cases. They redid the floors, wallpaper, bought furniture but made it look as if the furniture was that of its age, and sometimes it is. The house was well-maintained and continues to be well maintained since 1954, unlike the other home areas.
The historians and guides of the Owens and Thomas House have done a good job starting 2018 telling the whole story of all who lived in the home. They have begun to get into details about what it was like to be a slave in the Owens-Thomas House and the living situations that they endured. Bring in audio recordings and putting the names of slaves who were the property of the Owens family on display for all to see. Most museums, especially ones in Southern states and historical areas such as the Carolinas, Charleston, and Louisiana, have had to make changes in telling the full truth of African American life in the 19th century. In the nineteenth century, the presentation of life for enslaved people has been glossed over and said through Rose Colored Glasses. In a sense, the story becomes very white-washed and leads to a falsified idea of American history. So it's not uncommon to think that because the accounts of those Lives went untold, the areas that they lived in were not kept up and shown in their full light. Up until 1990, some tenants lived in the carriage house, and when they moved out, that is when the carriage house was transformed into offices for Museum staff. It wasn't until then that the staff discovered the urban slave quarters. There was still chipped blue paint with Indigo pigments and lye on the walls. There were original beams in the ceiling, plaster, and flooring. The discovery was unlike any other Museum in America at the time.
The project that began changing and preserving the slave quarters was called the Slavery and Freedom project. For the first time, the entire story of all who lived there was going to be told. From That point on, the Owens-Thomas house was called Owens-Thomas House and Slave Quarters. They began to restore the basement in its entirety, including the kitchen, the scullery, and bathing Chambers. They were brought back to life to show precisely how the enslaved people worked and lived within those walls. The Slavery and Freedom exhibit project obtained more than a million dollars from donors and the grant of $250,000 from the National Endowment for the Humanities to bring this story and these people's lives to light. Now when people walk through the slave quarters, thanks to the glass floor panels, people can see the original flooring beneath them as they walk to feel like they're right there within those walls as they once were. There's exposed ductwork as it would have been, and the piping was redone to Showcase what it would have been like when the house was first built. All in all, the Telfair Museum has been one of the best in telling the full story of life. But that didn't come along in 2018 even though the home and slave quarters' restoration process began in 1990.
Many agree that though the nation has come a long way in telling and examining enslaved folks' lifestyle in America, there's still a long way to go. And a high need for those Rose-Colored Glasses to break. The whole point of a museum that includes slavery is that you can't gloss over and be nice about what slavery was, including all the long-lasting issues that it brought along. Slavery was a terrible time in the nation, but it is what Built This Nation. America's stories can't be told in its entirety if one is to leave out those who were enslaved. Because it is well known that they built this country from the ground up, and that deserves to be recognized.