Crisis Decade (1850 – 1860)

…5. Brooklyn Historical Society. Church Debates on the Fugitive Slave Law “The Bible is Heavier than the Statute Book.” At Plymouth Church, on Orange between Henry and Hicks, the high profile abolitionist Henry Ward Beecher spoke out against the Fugitive Slave Law. The law allowed federal authorities to cross state lines and kidnap any person of color suspected of being a fugitive. For white abolitionists kidnapping under the Fugitive Slave Law wo…

Timeline

…1789 1863 ↦ 1789 Life, History and Unparalleled Sufferings of John Jea, the African Preacher, 1811. Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Columbia University. Teacher’s Manual Section 1: Lesson 2 The horses usually rested about five hours a day, while we were at work; thus did the beasts enjoy greater privileges than we did. (John Jea, The Life, History, and Unparalleled Sufferings of John Jea, 1811) John Jea lived and worked in Flatbush, King…

Games

…als, and create your own anti-slavery propaganda. It Happened in Brooklyn IN PURSUIT OF FREEDOM WRITE A POEM *Best viewed in Google Chrome & Safari IT HAPPENED in BROOKLYN Click on the titles on the right for additional information. Drag the circles to their proper locations on the map. Havemeyer, Townsend & Co. Sugar Refinery Havemeyer,Townsend & Co. Sugar Refinery opened on the Williamsburg Waterfront in 1856. Sugar was the larges…

A Gradual Emancipation (1783 – 1827)

…s. Slaveholding Capital Life, History and Unparalleled Sufferings of John Jea, the African Preacher, 1811. Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Columbia University. Teacher’s Manual Section 1: Lesson 2 The horses usually rested about five hours a day, while we were at work; thus did the beasts enjoy greater privileges than we did. (John Jea, The Life, History, and Unparalleled Sufferings of John Jea, 1811) John Jea lived and worked in Flatbush, King…

Abolitionist Brooklyn (1828 – 1849)

…MBO and Vinegar Hill. [70 Willow Street]. Eugene L. Armbruster. 1922. Eugene L. Armbruster photographs and scrapbooks. V1974.32.99. Brooklyn Historical Society. In 1831, Adrian Van Sinderen, president of the Brooklyn Savings Bank, was also president of the Brooklyn Colonization Society, a local branch of the American Colonization Society (ACS). The organization sought to relocate free black communities to Liberia, and Van Sinderen raised a signif…

Exhibitions

…n employs superhero imagery to re-imagine alter-egos of key Weeksville figures. Color Between
the Lines Color Between the Lines Irondale’s exhibit will focus on social change through storytelling. The exhibit will explore the abolitionists as a group of men and women, both black and white, who used public spaces and printed materials to convey the horrors of slavery. In doing so, they created a performance culture of their own. Eve…