In Indiana, books and Frederick Douglass bring history to life

When Frederick Douglass went to Pendleton, Ind., in 1843 to share his abolitionist message, a mob attacked him, tore down the platform where he stood and left him with a broken hand.

The next day, Douglass stood up and spoke again, this time from the back porch of the local Quaker Meeting House.

Nearly two centuries later, on a rainy spring day, Indiana fourth-graders squeezed into the pews of the meeting house that now stands on that same site, listening as actor Darius Wallace, who performs as Douglass, brought Douglass' life and legacy to the stage. Afterward, the students picked out brand-new books for their home libraries, thanks to the AFT's Reading Opens the World initiative, AFT Indiana and the Anderson Federation of Teachers.

For Sally Sloan, executive director of AFT Indiana and one of the event committee members, the day was about more than remembering history. By being there, by sitting together on that site, the multiracial group of children "were making history," she says, "not just recreating history."

"They had to squeeze in these pews because they couldn't be outside, and there was no hesitation," Sloan says. "They were really scrunched together, and you got the whole view of all of them, sitting together-listening to the story of a man who had been attacked for even suggesting such a thing. It was really beautiful to me. I hope we can keep moving in that direction."

The event grew out of a collaboration among AFT Indiana, local historical groups in Pendleton, including the South Madison Historical Foundation and the Historical Pendleton Fall Creek Society, and members of the Quaker Meeting House.

The historical societies had raised money to bring Wallace to Pendleton, and the Anderson Federation of Teachers provided money for transportation, but Sloan-a former librarian-wanted to provide books. She discovered the AFT's Reading Opens the World initiative and took it from there.

By the time the students arrived, the tables inside the meeting house were stacked with books about Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Rosa Parks, the Underground Railroad and the civil rights movement, along with other titles chosen to match children's interests.

"I just spread out and got as many books as I could that I thought children would be interested in, so they would get the books they want," she says. "The civil rights books went first. I was impressed that those were the books kids wanted most."

To be fair, there was also a child or two interested in Grossology: The Science of Really Gross Things! But that's the point, Sloan says: to pique children's interest in reading and help them find a book they want to take home.

It was Douglass, she noted, who understood the liberating power of reading and learning. At the event, there were T-shirts with one of his guiding ideals printed across the back: "Education is emancipation."

The students were rapt as they listened to Wallace speak as Douglass and tell his story, Sloan says. She watched them listen to the story of enslavement, the Underground Railroad and Douglass' life as a Black man in America. She watched them take in the parts that were difficult to hear. After the reenactment, the students asked question after question, demonstrating how deeply they were engaged.

"I was just amazed at how much they understood," Sloan says. "You could just see that in them. Their questions were so on target; they were so specific to Frederick Douglass and what he experienced. They really learned from him, and they were just lit up the entire time."

That mattered to Sloan. It showed that not only could children handle honest history, but they also wanted to understand it.

And it demonstrates another of Douglass' observations: "Once you learn to read, you will be forever free."

[Melanie Boyer]