William Still And His Freedom Stories

From award-winning author-illustrator Don Tate comes a remarkable picture book biography of William Still, known as Father of the Underground Railroad. William Still's parents escaped slavery but had to leave two of their children behind, a tragedy that haunted the family. As a young man, William went to work for the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society, where he raised money, planned rescues, and helped freedom seekers who had traveled north. One day, a strangely familiar man came into William's office, searching for information about his long-lost family. Could it be? Motivated by his own family's experience, William Still began collecting the stories of thousands of other freedom seekers. As a result, he was able to reunite other families and build a remarkable source of information, including encounters with Harriet Tubman, Henry "Box" Brown, and William and Ellen Craft. Award-winning author-illustrator Don Tate brings to life the incredible, true story of William Still, a man who dedicated his life to recording the stories of enslaved people fleeing to freedom. Tate's powerful words and artwork are sure to inspire young readers in this first-ever picture book biography of the Father of the Underground Railroad.

From award-winning author-illustrator Don Tate comes a remarkable picture book biography of William Still, known as Father of the Underground Railroad. William Still's parents escaped slavery but had to leave two of their children behind, a tragedy that haunted the family. As a young man, William went to work for the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society, where he raised money, planned rescues, and helped freedom seekers who had traveled north. One day, a strangely familiar man came into William's office, searching for information about his long-lost family. Could it be? Motivated by his own family's experience, William Still began collecting the stories of thousands of other freedom seekers. As a result, he was able to reunite other families and build a remarkable source of information, including encounters with Harriet Tubman, Henry "Box" Brown, and William and Ellen Craft. Award-winning author-illustrator Don Tate brings to life the incredible, true story of William Still, a man who dedicated his life to recording the stories of enslaved people fleeing to freedom. Tate's powerful words and artwork are sure to inspire young readers in this first-ever picture book biography of the Father of the Underground Railroad.

Published to coincide with Black History Month and the opening of the new Underground Railroad Museum in Cincinnati, Fleeing for Freedom includes selected narratives from the two most important contemporary chroniclers of the Underground Railroad, Levi Coffin and William Still. Here are firsthand descriptions of the experiences of escaped slaves making their way to freedom in the North and in Canada in the years before the Civil War. George and Willene Hendrick have chosen a broad range of stories to reflect the strategies, tactics, heartbreak, and dangers—for both the slaves and the "conductors"—of the secret network. In their Introduction, they provide basic information about the scope and workings of the Underground Railroad and its impact on slaves, slaveholders, and the Northern abolitionist societies that were so heavily involved. Fleeing for Freedom offers gripping personal accounts of one of the great collaborations between whites and blacks in American history. With 15 black-and-white engravings and line drawings.

William Still coordinated the Eastern Line of the Underground Railroad and was a pillar of the Railroad as a whole. Based in Philadelphia, Still built a reputation as a courageous leader, writer, philanthropist, and guide for fugitive slaves. This monumental work details Still's life story beginning with his parents' escape from bondage in the early nineteenth century and continuing through his youth and adulthood as one of the nation's most important Underground Railroad agents and, later, as an early civil rights pioneer. Still worked personally with Harriet Tubman, assisted the family of John Brown, helped Brown's associates escape from Harper's Ferry after their famous raid, and was a rival to Frederick Douglass among nationally prominent African American abolitionists. Still's life story is told in the broader context of the anti-slavery movement, Philadelphia Quaker and free black history, and the generational conflict that occurred between Still and a younger group of free black activists led by Octavius Catto.

From award-winning author-illustrator Don Tate comes a remarkable picture book biography of William Still, known as Father of the Underground Railroad. William Still's parents escaped slavery but had to leave two of their children behind, a tragedy that haunted the family. As a young man, William went to work for the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society, where he raised money, planned rescues, and helped freedom seekers who had traveled north. One day, a strangely familiar man came into William's office, searching for information about his long-lost family. Could it be? Motivated by his own family's experience, William Still began collecting the stories of thousands of other freedom seekers. As a result, he was able to reunite other families and build a remarkable source of information, including encounters with Harriet Tubman, Henry "Box" Brown, and William and Ellen Craft. Award-winning author-illustrator Don Tate brings to life the incredible, true story of William Still, a man who dedicated his life to recording the stories of enslaved people fleeing to freedom. Tate's powerful words and artwork are sure to inspire young readers in this first-ever picture book biography of the Father of the Underground Railroad.

During the 1830s, people began using the term “Underground Railroad” to refer to a loose network of individuals who provided hiding places for runaway slaves and helped them move forward on their journey to freedom. Working for the Underground Railroad in Philadelphia, a free black man named William Still aided hundreds of fugitives passing through the city on their way north. From these runaway slaves, Still heard painful stories of humiliation and cruelty, along with inspiring accounts of their determination to escape. He wrote down what the fugitives told him and, after the Civil War, published their remarkable accounts in a book entitled The Underground Railroad.

Award-winning author-illustrator Don Tate celebrates the first southern Black writer to be published in this first-ever picture book biography of George Moses Horton. George loved words, but he was also enslaved. Forced to work long hours, he was unable to attend school or learn how to read. But he was determined―he listened to the white children's lessons and learned the alphabet. Then he taught himself to read. Soon, he began composing poetry in his head and reciting it aloud as he sold fruits and vegetables on a nearby college campus. News of the enslaved poet traveled quickly among the students, and before long, George had customers for his poems. But George was still enslaved. Would he ever be free? In this powerful biography, Don Tate tells an inspiring and moving story of talent and determination.

The Stills were the prototypical African American family who lived, worked, and sometimes prospered before, during, and after the Civil War. History is replete with the selfless contributions of these black individuals. Beginning in the waning decades of the 18th century on Maryland's Eastern Shore, a slave named Levin Steel confronted his slave master with a demand his owner could not ignore-his urge to be a free man. He bought himself, settled in the Pines of Burlington County, New Jersey, in 1806, and was soon joined there by his self-emancipated wife, Charity. The dynasty these hardworking former slaves began in 1807 produced a bevy of freeborn children, who were the ancestors of our central character, William Still. Although it was William who ran station two, the hub of the American Underground Railroad in Philadelphia, beginning in the 1840s, his siblings accomplished a staggering list of professional, entrepreneurial, social welfare, and legal activities while the mass of American slaves lay in chains in the South. After the Civil War, when emancipation came to the slaves, William Still, a successful coal merchant, used his own money to finance a host of civil rights and other social reforms to elevate the freed men arriving in the city.