OUR PROGRAM - BLACK HISTORY IS AMERICAN HISTORY
Throughout February, we will share our PTSA programming. We will also include news about the exciting educational experiences that schools across our district have planned to help students and families celebrate Black History Month.
Week 3 : African American Patriots, Change Makers, and Pursuit of Equity
Week 4 : Advancing Black Culture
Week 5 : Protecting and Realizing Civil Rights in Current Times
Notable Black Abolitionists of the Western New York Region (1700s-1800s)
In 1811, slaveholder Captain William Helm moved to Upstate New York and settled in Bath, NY. With him, Helm brought Austin Steward, among 50-100 other enslaved Black people.
During the same year, Colonel Nathanial Rochester of Virginia, [1852-1831] purchased and established the town of "Rochesterville"—later named Rochester in 1817—on the Upper Falls tract. Prior to setting in Upstate New York, Rochester lived as a soldier, merchant, and slave trader in Maryland, and brought 10 personal slaves north with him.
During a trip to Geneva and Canandaigua, Austin Steward heard speeches by White abolitionists from the Manumission Society. In 1814, after advisement that he was being held illegally as a slave, Steward escaped and negotiated to retain his freedom with the aid of Darius Comstock, president of the Ontario County Manumission Society.
In 1817, Steward became a successful entrepreneur, opening a meat market in Brighton. In 1818, Steward established “The Sabbath School for Children of Color” in Rochester.
In 1827, as slavery was “abolished” in New York State, Steward gave the Emancipation speech on July 5, 1827, in Rochester. His oration encouraged people of color to educate themselves, become entrepreneurs, and live lives of integrity based on faith. In 1828, Steward was elected as a trustee of the First African Methodist Episcopal Church in Rochester, the church founded by Rev. Thomas James, the same church where Frederick Douglas later found support for his abolitionist newspaper, The North Star.
After many years of successful business, Austin Steward hears about fugitive slaves from other states trying to secure freedom in Canada and is compelled to help them. He closes his business and moves his family to Canada in 1830.
However, after 12 years of trying to improve the situation for freed slaves in Wilberforce Colony, London, Canada, a victim of corruption and embezzlement, Steward returns to Canandaigua impoverished, to teach school, lecture, write and work with anti-slavery groups. In 1867, Twenty-two years a Slave by Austin Steward is published. Austin Steward passes away and is laid to rest in Canandaigua in 1869.
In 1804, Thomas James (then Tom) was born into slavery in Canajoharie, N.Y. He was sold and traded several times before escaping slavery in 1821 and running along the Eire Canal corridor to Niagara, Canada. He returned to the Lockport/Rochester area 3 months later, found work, and began religious studies, and adopted the name James.
In 1829, James began preaching in Rochester, purchased land on Favor Street in the Corn Hill area, and built the first of three church buildings that would occupy that site.
As an ordained minister in 1833, Rev. James held the first of a series of anti-slavery society meetings in the courthouse. The leading promoters of the meeting were three abolitionists, William Bloss, Dr. Reid, and Dr. W. Smith. They purchase a printing press and began publishing a fortnightly paper called “The Rights of Man.”
For several decades (1830─1882) Rev. James continued with anti-slavery and missionary work throughout the Northeast and Midwest, aiding many emerging Black communities. In 1882, he returned to settle again in Western New York, this time in Lockport. In 1884, suffering cataracts he returned to live in Rochester.
In 1886, he wrote and published The Life of Rev. Thomas James, by Himself. He closed the book acknowledging that he was blessed by God that he "lived to see the liberation and the enfranchisement of the people of my color and blood," but offered a stern and final warning that freedom was not complete and that readers must not ignore the "social prejudices" that remain.
In 1891 Rev Thomas passes away in Rochester. In 1989, the city of Rochester named April 18, the anniversary of Thomas James' death, in his honor to be celebrated as an annual memorial.
Frederick Douglass [1818-1895] (American Abolitionist, Author, Orator)
In 1818, Frederick Douglas born into slavery in Maryland
1837: Frederick Douglas escapes to freedom to New York city
1845: Frederick Douglass writes his autobiography (revised and completed in 1882 as Life and Times of Frederick Douglas). To avoid recapture by his former owner, whose name and location he had given in the narrative, Douglass left on a two-year speaking tour of Great Britain and Ireland.
1847 - After returning to the U.S. in 1847, using £500 (equivalent to $46,030 in 2019) given him by English supporters, Frederick Douglass starts publishing his first abolitionist newspaper, the North Star, from the basement of the Memorial AME Zion Church in Rochester, New York.
1848 - Douglass attends Women's Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, Northern Freeman abolitionist paper is published by Butts & Merrell
1855 - “My Bondage and My Freedom” by Douglass is published in Auburn
1859 - John Brown's raid at Harper's Ferry occurs; Brown accomplice and Rochester abolitionist Shields Green is captured and hanged. Frederick Douglass, even though opposing use of violence, flees to England to avoid capture as John Brown's accomplice
1860 - Frederick Douglass returns home
1861–65: During the Civil War Fredrick Douglass becomes a consultant to Pres. Abraham Lincoln, advocating that former slaves be armed for the North and that the war be made a direct confrontation against slavery
1865-77: Throughout Reconstruction, Douglas fights for full civil rights for freedmen and vigorously supports the women’s rights movement.
1870 - 15th Amendment passed, giving equal voting rights to Black men in the United States, including New York.
1872 - Frederick Douglass appointed to deliver the votes of the New York members of the Electoral College to the U.S. Senate
1872 - Douglass' home on South Avenue burns; the family takes up residence in Washington, D.C.
1876, Douglass delivered the keynote speech at the unveiling of the Emancipation Memorial
During the reconstruction ere, Douglas held several key positions in government and as chairman of the Freedman's Savings Bank
1895 - Death of Frederick Douglass -- funeral and burial took place in Rochester
Harriet Tubman [1820-1913] (Abolitionist & Conductor of the Underground Railroad)
1821 - Harriet Tubman born into slavery in Maryland
1849 - Harriet Tubman escapes from Maryland to Philadelphia along the Underground Railroad
1851 - Harriet Tubman guided an unidentified group of 11 fugitives, possibly including the Bowleys and several others she had helped rescue earlier, northward. There is evidence to suggest that Tubman and her group stopped at the home of abolitionist and former slave Frederick Douglass.
1858, Tubman was introduced to the abolitionist John Brown, who advocated the use of violence to destroy slavery in the United States. Brown asks Tubman to gather former slaves then living in present-day Southern Ontario who might be willing to join his fighting force, which she did.
1859 - John Brown's raid at Harper's Ferry occurs; Brown accomplice and Rochester abolitionist Shields Green are captured and hanged. Tubman was not present due to working on the abolitionist movement in Auburn, NY.
1860 - Tubman conducted her last rescue mission. Unable to affect the escape of her sister Rachel, and Rachel's two children Ben and Angeline, Tubman gathered another group, including the Ennalls family and returns to Auburn, NY.
1861 - Abraham Lincoln is inaugurated, Southern states secede, Fort Sumter is attacked, First groups of New York State Volunteers are organized
1861 - Tubman joins Boston and Philadelphia abolitionists in South Carolina assisting and organizing fugitives. She worked to get former slaves recognized by north as free rather than “contraband”. Tubman condemned Lincoln's response and his general unwillingness to consider ending slavery in the U.S., for both moral and practical reasons. "God won't let master Lincoln beat the South till he does the right thing", she said.
1863 - Tubman becomes first woman to lead an armed assault during the Civil War.
1913 - Harriett Tubman passes away