The writer Gillian Brockel says that the artist Viktor Arnotov not only portrayed the image of US President George Washington on the walls of the San Francisco High School named after the first president in 1936, but painted scenes relating to the city of Washington itself.

The writer explains in an article in the Washington Post that the artist used fresco to paint portraits of scenes of cruelty against slaves and Indians alike.

The writer asks: George Washington owned slaves and ordered the killing of Indians, will this date remain hidden?

While the San Francisco school board says frescoes reinforce abusive stereotypes, historians say the opposite is true.

The school board voted to cover the frescoes by hiding them with paint but retracted the idea after public outrage.

Kill and enslave
The school's board sees it as damaging for students to look at pictures of President Washington skipping dead Native Americans on his ranch while ordering slaves.

These paintings cannot be stored or transferred to the museum, which makes up 13 of the detailed murals that span an area of ​​about 149 square meters from the entrance hall and the main staircase, and are part of the school.

She points out that the school board had already voted to cover the wall paintings by hiding them with paint, but retracted the idea after widespread public anger.

She adds that the plan now is to cover these murals with solid panels, although supporters of these historic murals insist that any cover should be removed from the surface.

Shackles and chains were used to restrict bonded slaves in America (Al Jazeera)

Layers and date
The writers say that these murals are the story of the layers of history that will continue to exist, whether the murals covered with curtains, paintings or paint.

The writer notes that George Washington owned humans before making a decision, explaining that he inherited 10 enslaved people when he was eleven years old when his father died.

She says the US president bought dozens of slaves as he grew up and that when he married Martha Costes in his late 20s, she brought more enslaved people to Mount Vernon, before he began opposing slavery.

The writer adds that after the outbreak of the civil war against the British colonial in the 1870s, President Washington expressed his intention to abandon the phenomenon of possession of slaves, and that, according to historians, was leading a war in which people say they are born free, and that freedom is a right of God to the slaves.

Slaves and the Law
The writer notes that Washington wrote a letter in 1778 stating that he wanted to "get rid" of slave ownership, but this step was not legal without the support of a special procedure of the state legislature.

The writer says Washington stopped buying and selling slaves after the Revolutionary War, but when the slaves' release became legal in 1782, he did not.

The writer asks what kind of slave owners President Washington had said, and said he had made efforts to keep the enslaved families together in the same property, and that he criticized other farm owners who were abusive.

However, Washington ordered the whipping of a slave man because he stepped on the lawn in the garden, and was tracking the fugitives, and that he took steps to prevent the release of his slaves during his visit to the Free States.

The writer says he did not hesitate to harness his slaves and get them to work, but he left a will to free 123 people he owned when he died.

She points out that Washington was a landowner, and that he always sought to expand his property across Native American land, demanding the purchase of large areas and then fighting long-term battles to prove ownership.