Hello. We’ve been writing this blog every day for almost twelve months now. As it was our intention to find out why every single day of the year is BRILLIANT, we now have less that a week to go. If we make it, there will be five more posts after this one. You can also find this blog on Wordpress, along with a short explanation of how it came about, and in which we reveal which of us has actually written all of this on the ’about’ page. Thank you all for reading, liking and re-posting. It’s been fun to reach so many people across the world from our small corner of rural North Yorkshire. Will we pick up three more followers to make it a round hundred before March 15th? Probably not…
Why March 10th is BRILLIANT
Freedom
Today we are celebrating the life of Harriet Tubman. Harriet was born a slave in Maryland. Because of this, we don’t know when her birthday was. Harriet did not even know what year she was born, never mind what day. It was probably some time between 1820 and 1825. Harriet escaped from slavery in 1849. Then she returned to free many other slaves. She was a spy for the Union during the Civil War. In later life she was active in the cause of women’s suffrage and built an old people’s home for coloured people. So we can’t celebrate her birthday, but because she did so many fantastic things in her life, we do know that she died on March 10th 1913.
Harriet was born Araminta Harriet Ross (Minty) to parents Ben Ross and Harriet ‘Rit’ Green who were both slaves. They were owned by Anthony Thompson and Mary Brodess. Ben and Rit had nine children and three of their daughters were sold to a distant plantation, separating them from the family forever. When someone else came to buy her youngest son, Rit hid him for a month and then threatened to split open the head of anyone who tried to take him away. The sale was abandoned. It was probably a formative experience for young Minty and likely influenced her belief in the possibilities of resistance.
She had a terrible childhood, being hired out to people who beat her. As an adolescent she witnessed an incident when a slave was found out of the fields without permission. His owner ordered Minty to assist him in restraining the man but she refused. The slave owner then threw a 2 lb metal weight at him, but it missed him and hit her on the head. It was a serious injury that she never recovered from. She suffered from seizures and periods of narcolepsy for the rest of her life. Already a deeply religious person, she also began to experience visions and vivid dreams that she interpreted as signs from God.
Her father was freed at the age of 45, though in fact, this made little difference to his status, as he still had to keep working for his former owner. Later, Harriet would find out that her mother was also supposed to have been freed at 45, but her owners had ignored the fact. She was not in a position to challenge this legally. In 1844 she married a free man called John Tubman and it was about this time she changed her name to Harriet. Not much is known about their marriage but if they had any children, they would have had the same status as Harriet and would also have been slaves.
In 1849, she escaped from her owners along with two of her brothers. They lost heart and returned to the plantation and Harriet went back with them. Shortly afterwards, she escaped again, this time alone. She would have got away using a series of safe houses known as the Underground Railroad and she managed to get across the state border to Pennsylvania where there was no slavery. Later she said: “When I found I had crossed that line, I looked at my hands to see if I was the same person. There was such a glory over everything; the sun came like gold through the trees, and over the fields, and I felt like I was in Heaven.”
But rather than stay safe in the north, Harriet returned to Maryland in 1850 to free members of her family. It would be the first of many covert trips she made across the border. Occasionally she came across a former owner but she cleverly managed to avoid detection. Simply by carrying a few chickens around, or pretending to read a newspaper (she couldn’t read) she found that the men simply didn’t notice her. As well as members of her family, including her parents, she guided many other slaves to freedom. In 1851, she attempted to free her husband, John Tubman, but found that he had married someone else and was quite happy where he was. Rather than make a scene, she just found other slaves who did want to be free and took them instead. Harriet Tubman was given the nickname 'Moses’ because, like Moses, she led her people to freedom.
In 1850, the US government passed a law that allowed escaped slaves to be returned even when they were living in a state where there was no slavery. Harriet re-routed the Underground Railroad to Canada, where people would be safe. In 1859 she was sold a piece of land in Auburn, New York by a US senator called William H Seward who was a fervent opponent of slavery. Despite the risk of arrest she brought her parents, who were then in Canada, to live with her there.
During the Civil War she worked for the Union Army as a cook and a nurse, but she was later employed as a spy. Her ability to travel in secret in enemy territory was extremely useful. In 1863, she led an assault on plantations along the Combahee River in South Carolina. She guided three steamboats around mines that had been laid by the Confederate Army. They burned the plantations and freed more than 750 slaves.
Harriet was never paid very much for her work during the Civil War and she remained poor. She worked to support her family and also took in boarders. Among them was a Civil War veteran called Nelson Davis. They fell in love and were married in 1869. He was twenty-two years younger than her. They lived together for twenty years. Later in life, she devoted herself to the cause of women’s suffrage. She travelled New York, Boston and Washington DC speaking of women’s right to vote. She described her actions during the Civil War and used many other examples of women from history as evidence of women’s equality to men. In 1897, in Boston, there were a series of receptions honouring her lifetime of service to the nation. Harriet had spent so much of her hard earned money helping others that she had to sell a cow in order to but the train ticket to get there.
At the beginning of the twentieth century, she donated a piece of land to build a home for aged and poor coloured people. In 1911, she was admitted there herself and died in 1913. Since her death, Harriet Tubman has become a magnificent source of inspiration for civil right activists. She devoted her whole life to helping others and freed somewhere in the region of a thousand slaves. It was dangerous work but they all made it through, she never lost a single life.
The Cultural Landscape at Harriet Tubman National Historical Park
Our nation has a rich legacy of cultural landscapes – from carriage roads to battlefields, designed gardens to vernacular homesteads, and industrial complexes to river valley settlements. The NPS Park Cultural Landscapes Program promotes the stewardship of significant landscapes through research, planning, maintenance, training, and education.
This video introduces the cultural landscape at Harriet Tubman National Historical Park and invites viewers to learn more. NPS staff from the park, descendants of Harriet Tubman, and other people associated with the area describe the features and significance of this unique landscape and actions that have been taken to preserve it.
This video, announced on March 10 in honor of Harriet Tubman Day, is the latest in a series of videos designed to facilitate the transfer of knowledge gained through cultural landscape research and communicate unique aspects of a particular landscape’s history and significance.
“The Cultural Landscape at Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad National Historical Park” is the latest addition to the Olmsted Center’s cultural landscape video series. Each video highlights the unique aspects of a particular landscape’s history and significance, and together they help to communicate the process and outcomes of cultural landscape research.
Ms. Harriet Tubman has an astonishing legacy: a leader of enslaved people to freedom, a nurse, spy, and cook in the Civil War, a caretaker for the sick and elderly, and a suffragist. Her actions have touched generations of people looking to improve the quality of the human condition. Proof of her reach can be seen in the art created by those inspired by her extraordinary life.
Visual Art
In this portrait, painted by William H. Johnson, Ms. Tubman stands before a day and night connected by a railroad passing by her feet. She is tall, taller than everything else, and is wearing a bonnet that evokes a Christ-like halo – she is “the Moses of her people,” after all.
American folk music icon Woody Guthrie wrote the biographical tune “Harriet Tubman’s Ballad” in celebration of her life. The most powerful line of the song?
To Abe Lincoln this I said: You’ve just crippled that snake of slavery We’ve got to fight to kill him dead.
While this poem by Eloise Greenfield includes a few exaggerations about Ms. Tubman’s life, the beauty in her journey remains: her determination, selflessness, and courage ensured that she and those she led to freedom “wasn’t going to stay [a slave] either.”
Harriet Tubman by Eloise Greenfield
Harriet Tubman didn’t take no stuff Wasn’t scared of nothing neither Didn’t come in this world to be no slave And wasn’t going to stay one either
“Farewell!” she sang to her friends one night She was mighty sad to leave ‘em But she ran away that dark, hot night Ran looking for her freedom
She ran to the woods and she ran through the woods With the slave catchers right behind her And she kept on going ‘til she got to the North Where those mean men couldn’t find her
Nineteen times she went back to the South To get three hundred others She ran for her freedom nineteen times To save Black sisters and brothers
Harriet Tubman didn’t take no stuff Wasn’t scared of nothing neither Didn’t come in this world to be no slave And didn’t stay one either
And didn’t stay one either
This December, we will be releasing our newest book, Harriet Tubman For Beginners by Annette Alston and illustrated by Lynsey Hutchinson. Follow this blog to learn more about Harriet’s life and legacy as we lead up to the release.
In exciting news, the renowned artist Joyce Scott has unveiled her larger-than-life, beautiful, and haunting Harriet Tubman sculptures at New Jersey’s Grounds for Sculpture. Read more about it here, and if you’re in New Jersey before April 1, 2018 - check it out!
Ms. Harriet Tubman has an astonishing legacy: a leader of enslaved people to freedom, a nurse, spy, and cook in the Civil War, a caretaker for the sick and elderly, and a suffragist. Her actions have touched generations of people looking to improve the quality of the human condition. Proof of her reach can be seen in the art created by those inspired by her extraordinary life.
Visual Art
In this portrait, painted by William H. Johnson, Ms. Tubman stands before a day and night connected by a railroad passing by her feet. She is tall, taller than everything else, and is wearing a bonnet that evokes a Christ-like halo – she is “the Moses of her people,” after all.
American folk music icon Woody Guthrie wrote the biographical tune “Harriet Tubman’s Ballad” in celebration of her life. The most powerful line of the song?
To Abe Lincoln this I said: You’ve just crippled that snake of slavery We’ve got to fight to kill him dead.
While this poem by Eloise Greenfield includes a few exaggerations about Ms. Tubman’s life, the beauty in her journey remains: her determination, selflessness, and courage ensured that she and those she led to freedom “wasn’t going to stay [a slave] either.”
Harriet Tubman by Eloise Greenfield
Harriet Tubman didn’t take no stuff Wasn’t scared of nothing neither Didn’t come in this world to be no slave And wasn’t going to stay one either
“Farewell!” she sang to her friends one night She was mighty sad to leave ‘em But she ran away that dark, hot night Ran looking for her freedom
She ran to the woods and she ran through the woods With the slave catchers right behind her And she kept on going ‘til she got to the North Where those mean men couldn’t find her
Nineteen times she went back to the South To get three hundred others She ran for her freedom nineteen times To save Black sisters and brothers
Harriet Tubman didn’t take no stuff Wasn’t scared of nothing neither Didn’t come in this world to be no slave And didn’t stay one either
And didn’t stay one either
This December, we will be releasing our newest book, Harriet Tubman For Beginners by Annette Alston and illustrated by Lynsey Hutchinson. Follow this blog to learn more about Harriet’s life and legacy as we lead up to the release.
Ms. Harriet Tubman has an astonishing legacy: a leader of enslaved people to freedom, a nurse, spy, and cook in the Civil War, a caretaker for the sick and elderly, and a suffragist. Her actions have touched generations of people looking to improve the quality of the human condition. Proof of her reach can be seen in the art created by those inspired by her extraordinary life.
Visual Art
In this portrait, painted by William H. Johnson, Ms. Tubman stands before a day and night connected by a railroad passing by her feet. She is tall, taller than everything else, and is wearing a bonnet that evokes a Christ-like halo – she is “the Moses of her people,” after all.
American folk music icon Woody Guthrie wrote the biographical tune “Harriet Tubman’s Ballad” in celebration of her life. The most powerful line of the song?
To Abe Lincoln this I said: You’ve just crippled that snake of slavery We’ve got to fight to kill him dead.
While this poem by Eloise Greenfield includes a few exaggerations about Ms. Tubman’s life, the beauty in her journey remains: her determination, selflessness, and courage ensured that she and those she led to freedom “wasn’t going to stay [a slave] either.”
Harriet Tubman by Eloise Greenfield
Harriet Tubman didn’t take no stuff Wasn’t scared of nothing neither Didn’t come in this world to be no slave And wasn’t going to stay one either
“Farewell!” she sang to her friends one night She was mighty sad to leave ‘em But she ran away that dark, hot night Ran looking for her freedom
She ran to the woods and she ran through the woods With the slave catchers right behind her And she kept on going ‘til she got to the North Where those mean men couldn’t find her
Nineteen times she went back to the South To get three hundred others She ran for her freedom nineteen times To save Black sisters and brothers
Harriet Tubman didn’t take no stuff Wasn’t scared of nothing neither Didn’t come in this world to be no slave And didn’t stay one either
And didn’t stay one either
This December, we will be releasing our newest book, Harriet Tubman For Beginners by Annette Alston and illustrated by Lynsey Hutchinson. Follow this blog to learn more about Harriet’s life and legacy as we lead up to the release.
Ms. Harriet Tubman has an astonishing legacy: a leader of enslaved people to freedom, a nurse, spy, and cook in the Civil War, a caretaker for the sick and elderly, and a suffragist. Her actions have touched generations of people looking to improve the quality of the human condition. Proof of her reach can be seen in the art created by those inspired by her extraordinary life.
Visual Art
In this portrait, painted by William H. Johnson, Ms. Tubman stands before a day and night connected by a railroad passing by her feet. She is tall, taller than everything else, and is wearing a bonnet that evokes a Christ-like halo – she is “the Moses of her people,” after all.
American folk music icon Woody Guthrie wrote the biographical tune “Harriet Tubman’s Ballad” in celebration of her life. The most powerful line of the song?
To Abe Lincoln this I said: You’ve just crippled that snake of slavery We’ve got to fight to kill him dead.
While this poem by Eloise Greenfield includes a few exaggerations about Ms. Tubman’s life, the beauty in her journey remains: her determination, selflessness, and courage ensured that she and those she led to freedom “wasn’t going to stay [a slave] either.”
Harriet Tubman by Eloise Greenfield
Harriet Tubman didn’t take no stuff Wasn’t scared of nothing neither Didn’t come in this world to be no slave And wasn’t going to stay one either
“Farewell!” she sang to her friends one night She was mighty sad to leave ‘em But she ran away that dark, hot night Ran looking for her freedom
She ran to the woods and she ran through the woods With the slave catchers right behind her And she kept on going ‘til she got to the North Where those mean men couldn’t find her
Nineteen times she went back to the South To get three hundred others She ran for her freedom nineteen times To save Black sisters and brothers
Harriet Tubman didn’t take no stuff Wasn’t scared of nothing neither Didn’t come in this world to be no slave And didn’t stay one either
And didn’t stay one either
This December, we will be releasing our newest book, Harriet Tubman For Beginners by Annette Alston and illustrated by Lynsey Hutchinson. Follow this blog to learn more about Harriet’s life and legacy as we lead up to the release.
Have you heard about the battle over the $20 bill? When a grassroots organization called Women on 20s started a movement to replace Andrew Jackson with a historically significant woman on the 20 by 2020, the popular vote went to Harriet Tubman. Obama’s Treasury Secretary Jack Lew was all for it, vowing to put Harriet Tubman on the front of the 20 (but keep Jackson on the back) and even laying out plans to redesign the backs of the 10 and 5 to feature notable women who were suffragists, civil rights leaders, and political figures.
Trump’s Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin will not say if he endorses these plans (namely placing Harriet Tubman on the 20), saying that “we’ve got a lot more important issues to focus on.” More important than gender and racial representation and equality?
We’ve laid out the facts so you can be the judge:
Who should be on the 20: Harriet Tubman or Andrew Jackson?
Fact #1:
Andrew Jackson owned hundreds of slaves who were the source of his wealth, and he did not free them in his will.
Harriet Tubman was a slave who escaped slavery and then returned to the South nearly a dozen times to free over one hundred other slaves.
Fact #2:
Andrew Jackson was a military hero whose accomplishments (like the Battle of New Orleans and the First Seminole War) won him enough public favor to be elected president.
Harriet Tubman was also a military hero, but despite her spy work and pivotal role in the Combahee River Raid (which freed 750 enslaved people), she wasn’t paid her military pension by the US government until 2003.
Fact #3:
Andrew Jackson expanded voting rights for the (white male) middle class by loosening property ownership regulations.
Harriet Tubman advocated for (white and black) women to be granted the right to vote, but she died 7 years before the 19th Amendment was ratified.
Fact #4:
Andrew Jackson pursued his Indian Removal Act (aka the Trail of Tears) that forcibly removed 45,000 Native Americans from their land, decimating tribes and killing thousands.
Harriet Tubman did not do that.
So…what do you think?
This December, we will be releasing our newest book, Harriet Tubman For Beginners by Annette Alston and illustrated by Lynsey Hutchinson. Follow this blog to learn more about Harriet’s life and legacy as we lead up to the release.
Have you heard about the battle over the $20 bill? When a grassroots organization called Women on 20s started a movement to replace Andrew Jackson with a historically significant woman on the 20 by 2020, the popular vote went to Harriet Tubman. Obama’s Treasury Secretary Jack Lew was all for it, vowing to put Harriet Tubman on the front of the 20 (but keep Jackson on the back) and even laying out plans to redesign the backs of the 10 and 5 to feature notable women who were suffragists, civil rights leaders, and political figures.
Trump’s Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin will not say if he endorses these plans (namely placing Harriet Tubman on the 20), saying that “we’ve got a lot more important issues to focus on.” More important than gender and racial representation and equality?
We’ve laid out the facts so you can be the judge:
Who should be on the 20: Harriet Tubman or Andrew Jackson?
Fact #1:
Andrew Jackson owned hundreds of slaves who were the source of his wealth, and he did not free them in his will.
Harriet Tubman was a slave who escaped slavery and then returned to the South nearly a dozen times to free over one hundred other slaves.
Fact #2:
Andrew Jackson was a military hero whose accomplishments (like the Battle of New Orleans and the First Seminole War) won him enough public favor to be elected president.
Harriet Tubman was also a military hero, but despite her spy work and pivotal role in the Combahee River Raid (which freed 750 enslaved people), she wasn’t paid her military pension by the US government until 2003.
Fact #3:
Andrew Jackson expanded voting rights for the (white male) middle class by loosening property ownership regulations.
Harriet Tubman advocated for (white and black) women to be granted the right to vote, but she died 7 years before the 19th Amendment was ratified.
Fact #4:
Andrew Jackson pursued his Indian Removal Act (aka the Trail of Tears) that forcibly removed 45,000 Native Americans from their land, decimating tribes and killing thousands.
Harriet Tubman did not do that.
So…what do you think?
This December, we will be releasing our newest book, Harriet Tubman For Beginners by Annette Alston and illustrated by Lynsey Hutchinson. Follow this blog to learn more about Harriet’s life and legacy as we lead up to the release.
Harriet Tubman is known to all as a conductor of the Underground Railroad who led hundreds of enslaved people to freedom. It is for this legacy that her stoic, weathered face was elected by popular vote to grace the $20 bill in 2020. (However, the Treasury Secretary may not go forward with this decision made during the Obama Administration, an infuriating announcement you can read more about here.)
Her extraordinary life, far-reaching actions, and immeasurable impact on those she knew have elevated her to a myth-like status in American history. But Harriet was a real, flesh-and-blood woman who spent her life fighting for a better life for African Americans. To understand her life in full, here are five important things to know about Harriet Tubman:
Harriet Tubman is known to all as a conductor of the Underground Railroad who led hundreds of enslaved people to freedom. It is for this legacy that her stoic, weathered face was elected by popular vote to grace the $20 bill in 2020. (However, the Treasury Secretary may not go forward with this decision made during the Obama Administration, an infuriating announcement you can read more about here.)
Her extraordinary life, far-reaching actions, and immeasurable impact on those she knew have elevated her to a myth-like status in American history. But Harriet was a real, flesh-and-blood woman who spent her life fighting for a better life for African Americans. To understand her life in full, here are five important things to know about Harriet Tubman:
1. Harriet Tubman wasn’t always, well, Harriet Tubman. She went by an assortment of names and nicknames, each denoting a different stage of her life and what she represented to her fellow African Americans. Born Araminta “Minty” Ross, she changed her name to Harriet Tubman after marrying John Tubman. (Her choice of first name is possibly in homage to her mother.) As a leader of the enslaved to freedom, she was the Moses of Her People. As a pre-war abolitionist, she was General Tubman. As a nurse in the Civil War, she was Black Moses. As an outspoken suffragist, she was Mother Tubman. And in her post-war years, she was, simply, Aunt Harriet.
2. In her tireless quest for black liberation, Harriet was an armed spy and scout for the Union during the Civil War. Her most notable accomplishment is her pivotal role in the Combahee River Raid. Under Colonel Montgomery, Harriet helped lead Union ships into the South Carolina harbor through mine-filled waters. Once they arrived, Union soldiers stole Confederate supplies and set fire to plantations. Amidst this chaos, 750 enslaved were freed and carried to the North in Union ships. The Moses of Her People once again led the slaves out of Egypt.
3. Post-war, Harriet used her seemingly boundless energy to support women’s suffrage. She was a member of the National Women’s Suffrage Association, founded by famous suffragette Susan B. Anthony, a fugitive slave harborer for the Underground Railroad and a wartime abolitionist. Later, put off by the racism of Southern suffragettes who were not inclusive of black women, she joined the National Association of Colored Women, where she was the keynote speaker at their inaugural meeting (as well as the oldest woman in attendance).
4. Always looking for ways to help others, Harriet long dreamed of opening a house for elderly and disabled blacks. Even after her own home caught fire (and she and her second husband, Nelson Charles Davis, rebuilt it literally brick by brick, as he was a brick-maker), Harriet was intent on seeing her dream realized. After years of mortgages, reconstruction, and debt, the Harriet Tubman Home for Aged and Infirmed Negroes (later shortened to the Harriet Tubman Home) opened in 1908.
5. After everything she had done for the Union, from spying and scouting to nursing and cooking, Harriet was never paid for her work in the War. Deeply unsatisfied with this injustice, Harriet spent the remainder of her life arguing for full compensation. It wasn’t until 2003 that the government corrected its wrongdoing when Hillary Clinton introduced a bill to pay Harriet’s pension, a total of $11,750, to the Harriet Tubman Home.
This December, we will be releasing our newest book, Harriet Tubman For Beginners by Annette Alston and illustrated by Lynsey Hutchinson. Alston delves into Tubman’s achievements, hardships, and faith while Hutchinson’s artwork punctuates the pages. Follow this blog to learn more about Harriet’s life and legacy.
