<p><strong>Pa. gov seeks funds for President’s House memorial</strong></p>
<p><strong>AP Photo NY109</strong></p>
<p><strong>By MARYCLAIRE DALE</strong></p>
<p><strong>Associated Press Writer</strong></p>
<p>PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A day after the nation inaugurated its first black president, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell announced that he asked a bistate agency to kick in $3.5 million for a memorial on the spot where the nation’s first leader lived with slaves.</p>
<p>“This project (now) has even greater significance,” former Mayor John Street said Wednesday of the President’s House commemoration, which has grown in scope during a decade of planning to include recognition of the nine slaves George Washington kept at the mansion near Independence Hall.</p>
<p>Rendell, joined at a news conference by Street and his successor, Mayor Michael Nutter, said he requested funds from the Delaware River Port Authority for the $8.4 million project. Earlier funding came from city and federal sources.</p>
<p>The Democratic governor, who serves as chairman of the transportation agency serving southeastern Pennsylvania and southern New Jersey, said he considers the grant a wise use of its funds, given the interest in historical and cultural tourism. The full DRPA board must approve the grant.</p>
<p>The memorial is a joint venture of the city and the National Park Service, which operates the surrounding Independence Mall Historical Park. Officials expect it to open in the fall of 2010. Nutter said he has asked President Barack Obama to attend the unveiling.</p>
<p>Washington and John Adams each lived at the President’s House when Philadelphia was the nation’s capital between 1790 and 1800. Only Washington kept slaves at the mansion, which was demolished in the 1830s.</p>
<p>“It certainly will tell the story of achievement,” Rendell said of the memorial. “But it is also a story of infamy.”</p>
<p>Controversy over the slavery issue grew when city and federal officials began planning a new home for the Liberty Bell. Some historians and black groups were outraged when it was revealed that the entrance to the new pavilion was near where the slaves once lived.</p>
<p>In 2002, Congress directed the National Park Service to “appropriately commemorate” the slaves. Under a revised plan drawn up after an archaeological dig found intact ruins in 2007, visitors will be able to view a slave passageway, a bow window that some consider the architectural precursor to the White House’s Oval Office and other remains.</p>
<p>“In this intense historical and cultural area, there was nothing for African-Americans,” said Venus Foster, 51, of Philadelphia, who belongs to an activist group called Avenging the Ancestors. Now they are eager to tour the President’s House and the slave remains, she said.</p>
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<p>On the Net:</p>
<p>The President’s House: http://www.phila.gov/presidentshouse</p>
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