News stories tagged with "abolition"

(05/02/12) Frederick Douglass' great-great-great grandson will be the keynote speaker at the annual John Brown Day celebration this Saturday at the historic John Brown Farm in Lake Placid. Ken Morris will talk about the friendship and legacy of Douglass and fellow abolitionist John Brown. The two first met in Massachusetts in 1848, a decade after Douglass escaped from slavery on a Maryland plantation.

Ken Morris is founder and president of the Frederick Douglas Family Foundation, a service learning organization that works to create a modern abolitionist movement in schools across the country. Morris is also the great-great grandson of Booker T. Washington. Before dedicating his career to social issues, Morris managed a successful marketing and entertainment firm. But he told Todd Moe that he spent his teen years, "decisively disengaged from his family lineage."

(04/24/12) Todd Moe talks with Syracuse University historian Milton Sernett, an expert on African American history. He'll give two talks in Canton on Thursday on Harriet Tubman, and the Underground Railroad in northern New York. Todd talks with him about how Tubman became the dominant symbol of the Underground Railroad and is still an inspiration today for many Americans.

(12/03/10) This morning in Lake Placid, teachers and historians and activists begin a two-day conference to talk about slavery.

New Yorkers played a big role in the slave trade in the 18th and 19th centuries, financing and profiting from an industry that ruined the lives of more than 12 million Africans.

Slave-owning wasn't banned in this state until 1827. Modern-day activists say human trafficking and exploitation is once again on the rise.

Martha Swan is with a group called John Brown Lives.

She told Brian Mann that this conference, which is open to the public, will explore the history and present-day reality of slavery. more

(07/23/10) Author, educator and artist Nell Irvin Painter spoke at the Elizabethtown County Courthouse on Sunday. She read selections from her new book, "The History of White People," and fielded questions from the audience. The talk was part of a series sponsored by modern day anti-slavery organizations John Brown Lives! and John Brown Coming Home. Sarah Harris attended and has our story.

(12/02/09) NCPR is media sponsor for John Brown Coming Home: A 150th Commemoration of abolitionist John Brown's life and legacy. Events take place this weekend at a variety of locations in and around Lake Placid, including the John Brown Farm. Cornell scholar Margaret Washington is one of the foremost authorities on the black experience in America. She'll give the keynote speech at a symposium in Lake Placid on Saturday. Her latest book, Sojourner Truth's America, is the story of the unlikely ascendancy of a black woman and former slave who became a rousing preacher and speaker. Washington spoke with Todd Moe about Sojourner Truth and black Americans as leaders in the abolitionist movement in the 19th century.

(05/08/09) This year, communities across the U.S. will commemorate abolitionist John Brown. Brown was hanged 150 years ago, after his famous raid on Harpers Ferry in Virginia. The remembrances begin tomorrow in Lake Placid with events at the John Brown Farm State Historic Site. Later in the year, organizers hope to re-enact the funeral procession that carried Brown's body across Lake Champlain from Vermont and then through Elizabethtown to Lake Placid. Brian Mann first reported on Brown's legacy in 2002.

(05/01/02) John Brown's life and work as an anti-slavery crusader will be commemorated Sunday afternoon at the Old County Courthouse in Elizabethtown, and at the John Brown Farm State Historic Site in Lake Placid. We hear from the keynote speaker at Sunday's event - Dennis Brutus, South African poet and human rights activist.

(06/26/01) We hear about Timbuctoo, a movement to settle free black New Yorkers in the Adirondacks--from the curator of a new exhibit opening this week at the Adirondack Museum. It was more than just a homesteading plan--the issue was voting rights.