Racism is deeply rooted and alive within the Midwest's agricultural history and can be seen woven into the infrastructure of the Great Plains. Ghost of the Plains is a body of work that utilizes black-and-white photographs to focus on individual stories of Black farmers and Black horsemen, whose existence is only revealed through a glimpse of a rewritten history.

This composition began in the hidden world off the beaten path, where Black individuals were simply taking care of what was inherited or purchased through sweat equity—a people currently living on the margins of ancestral slave land in the 21st century, spread across present-day counties surrounding Kansas and the Midwest. During the post-slavery era, many Blacks turned to the USDA and FSA to begin building a life. Many migrated from the South to the Plains, drawn by promises of land and opportunity. However, these promises, like much of America’s complicated and tangled history, remain unfulfilled.

Black horsemen and Black farmers, once enslaved people who had escaped their captors but did not flee to the North, created a life in the hard-to-farm Midwest plains. Their current-day paths intersect where former slaves and runaways once hung from trees, and these memories are now unveiled in this collective body of work.

As I travel across the state photographing Black horsemen and farmers, two groups connected by their love of farming, ranching, trail riding, and cowboying, a consistent statement is expressed: “I don't have much!” My proposed project works to expand narratives about the Black experience and our connection to the "Midwest American" landscape.

Black horsemen may be seen gaiting down rural or city streets, putting their equestrian skills on display for all to see, while the Black farmer remains in outlying, remote parcels of land, humbly eking out a living. Both are a dichotomy of their counterparts, and both are captured nestled in the Plains—Ghost of the Plains!