There and Not Yet There: Recovering the Life of Zipporah Potter Atkins

In 1670, a free Black woman named Zipporah Potter purchased a house and land in Boston, becoming the earliest known Black woman in the city to own property. Despite this extraordinary achievement, much of her life remains obscured in the fragmentary records of colonial Boston. This presentation argues that Zipporah Potter Atkins’ story reveals both the possibilities and the limits of reconstructing Black life in early Boston.

Drawing upon property records, wills, church documents, court records, and historical maps, the talk reconstructs the social landscape of 17th century Boston through the lens of one remarkable woman. Born to Richard and Grace, two Africans who had been enslaved in colonial Boston, Zipporah lived at the intersection of slavery and freedom during a period when racial boundaries and legal definitions of bondage were still taking shape. Her story shows how free Black people in early New England challenged assumptions about race, property ownership, and belonging in colonial America.

At the same time, the presentation explores the challenges historians face when researching individuals who appear only briefly in the archival record. What does it mean to write history when the evidence is incomplete? How do we recover lives that have been marginalized, overlooked, or forgotten? Through a combination of historical research and critical interpretation, Zipporah's story becomes a case study in the archives’ possibilities and limitations.

This talk invites audiences to reconsider who is remembered, who is forgotten and why. Zipporah’s life reveals a colonial Boston that was more diverse, more complex and more entangled with the histories of slavery and freedom than many people realize. In exploring and recovering what we can of her story, we gain not only a deeper understanding of Boston's past but also new insights into the ongoing work of historical preservation, public memory and historical justice.

Dorothy Clark has worked for the Boston Landmarks Commission, Historic New England, The Boston Globe, Boston Herald and the Bay State Banner. She holds a master’s in Design Studies/Historic Preservation from the Boston Architectural College, a master’s in American history from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and a bachelor’s in English/journalism, also from UMass Amherst. An independent researcher and historian, she is an adjunct faculty member at the Boston Architectural College, where she teaches an undergraduate world history survey course and is a writing tutor.

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Image: This marker was dedicated in 2014 during a ceremony led by Gov. Duval Patrick. Many were in attendance, including Dr. Vivian Johnson, the Boston University professor emerita who discovered Zipporah's deed. The marker features a replica of the initials Zipporah signed on the deed (ZA). While her house was on Salem Street in the North End, the marker is located on the Rose Kennedy Greenway, near the intersection of John F. Fitzgerald Surface Road and Hanover Street.

The marker was commissioned by the Heritage Guild, an organization of women that placed historical markers on the homes of Black Bostonians. It reads: "Zipporah Potter Atkins (c1645-1705), the only 17th century woman of African descent to buy land in Boston, purchased a house on this site in 1670. Born free despite enslavement of Africans in Massachusetts, she was a North End resident from 1670-1699 when she became the first African woman to sign her initials on a Deed in Suffolk County." /Dorothy Clark