Freedom's Legacy

You are six years old. One morning you wake up and your mother and sisters are gone. A stranger appears and offers to help you find your family. You go with him, only to find out that you've been sold. Sold! The stranger delivers you to your new owner. You are powerless. No matter what happens, you cannot fight back. You are a slave.

Ask your booktalk audience how they would feel if this happened to them. Tell them it may have happened to some of their relatives, or perhaps to the great-grandparents of some of their friends. The boy in this particular story, Peter Still, lived in Alabama in about 1806. Still grew up a slave, but dreamt of freedom, and as a man, dreamt of that same freedom for his wife and children.

Forty-eight years passed before Still was able to buy his way out of slavery. Once free, he headed north and, incredibly, found his mother. Then Still returned to Alabama—where even free African Americans could be reenslaved—to rescue the rest of his family. Dennis Fradin's My Family Shall Be Free: The Life of Peter Still (HarperCollins, 2001, Gr 4 Up) recounts Still's incredible story.

More remarkable lives appear in Tell All the Children Our Story: Memories and Mementos of Being Young and Black in America (Abrams, 2001, Gr 5–Up) by Tanya Bolden. What was it like to live under Jim Crow laws, which denied equality to black Americans? What was it like to live in terror that the Ku Klux Klan might burn down your home, or even kill you and your loved ones? Hearing about these experiences will haunt your listeners.

When did the first black children come to America? Youngsters may be surprised to learn that the first black Americans weren't slaves. In Bolden's book, we learn that the first black child was born in Virginia in 1624, just four years after the Pilgrims landed. The child, William, was not a slave and neither were his parents. They were indentured servants who were obliged by contract to work a certain number of years. Indentured servants faced a harsh life, but better than the lot endured by slaves who came later.

Those born into slavery would most likely die as slaves. With little more than rags to wear and scarcely enough to eat, they were forced to work long hours, under the worst conditions.

Unless they were brave enough to run away.

Bound for the North Star: True Stories of Fugitive Slaves (Clarion, 2000, Gr 4 Up) also by Fradin, is a thrilling read. Slaves bent on escape would be beaten if caught, and likely sold into worse conditions, or even killed. Since it was illegal to teach slaves to read, they could not decipher a map, if they were lucky enough to find one. Consequently, many runaway slaves were guided by the North Star. And at least two slaves boxed themselves up in crates and successfully shipped themselves north! A married couple escaped when the wife, light-skinned and disguised as a young man, took a train ride north with her husband—who pretended to be her slave.

Doreen Rappaport tells us in No More! Stories and Songs of Slave Resistance (Candlewick, 2002, Gr 3–6) how slaves rebelled against captivity, whether in Africa, aboard slave ships, or on American soil.

Olaudah Equiano was captured when he was 10 years old. Olaudah was forced aboard what seemed to him a ship from hell. Some of his shipmates preferred drowning at sea, rather than living as slaves in an unknown, distant land. Olaudah watched them jump overboard and perish. Some escaped when the ship reached America. After 20 years as a slave, Olaudah was able to purchase his freedom. All of the stories in No More! are incredible and the illustrations by Shane Evans are compelling.

Today, many of the descendants of slaves continue to fight for freedom and equal rights. Although the lives of black Americans have improved in the last 50 years, there are still gains to be made. These amazing stories of liberation are sure to touch the hearts and minds of your young listeners. The sweetness of freedom can be savored at any age.