WEBVTT
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Hello, everyone.
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Welcome to the Revolution
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Two Fifty podcast.
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I am Bob Allison.
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I chair the Revolution Two
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Fifty Advisory Group.
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We are a consortium of
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seventy five organizations
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in Massachusetts planning
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commemorations of the
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beginnings of American independence.
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And our guest today is Ray
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Anthony Shepherd,
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who's an award winning biographer.
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He came to this after a
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career as a teacher and as
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a textbook editor.
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He's also a member of the
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Massachusetts Commission on
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the two hundred fiftieth
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anniversary of the American Revolution,
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a fellow of the Mass Historical Society.
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So, Ray, thank you for joining us.
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Well, thank you, Bob.
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And I'm pleased to be here.
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And your books include
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you've done a book on own a
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judge and a book on the
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Massachusetts fifty fourth.
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And you have a book coming
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out early next year called The Forgotten.
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Patriots of Color at
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Lexington and Concord.
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Your books mainly are for young readers,
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but I think people of all
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ages will learn and enjoy them.
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What I try to do is write
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biographies that appeal to
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young readers and the young
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at heart from ten to a
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hundred in terms of both
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adults and young readers.
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For me,
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that's very important because it's
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a way of reaching a number of people and
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changing or helping them
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better understand the role
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of race in American history,
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and of course, in their lives.
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And in doing it in such a
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way that by reading a book,
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it's a safe place to think
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about questions that
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perhaps been on their mind,
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but they can find an answer, as I said,
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in a safe place in a way that
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And it increases their full
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understanding of American history.
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And your book on the
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Massachusetts fifty fourth
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focuses on two of the
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soldiers in that regiment.
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And I'm just wondering about
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the focus in the forgotten
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the book about the
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Lexington and conquer
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that's coming out next year.
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I mean,
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how do you approach that big subject?
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Well,
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I'm focused on the first day of the
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American Revolution.
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That is the morning of the April,
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and if you think of the
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events of that day,
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from the alarm riders,
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the marching of the British,
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the massacre at Lexington,
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moving on to Concord, the retreat,
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and eventually crossing
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back over into Charlestown.
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That's an incredible day in which
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It is not an overstatement when Emerson,
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a hundred years later,
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says the shot heard around the world.
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Four thousand people,
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an estimate of four
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thousand patriots
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participated in that battle
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against some eight hundred
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British regulars.
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But also,
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what is erased from American
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history is the fact that
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as many as thirty forty um
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enslaved americans also
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participated in in in those
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battles and so I'm telling
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the story uh in the from
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the perspective of those
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patriots of color who were
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at lexington who were at
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concord who were a young
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kid nine-year-old who was
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alarm writer and so and
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That's what I'm trying.
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That's what I've done in
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this particular book.
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Now,
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do you find it important when you're
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writing for young readers
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to have young characters
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like a nine-year-old?
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It varies.
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I think the traditional
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answer would be yes.
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But if you're writing so
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much about American history,
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it happened obviously to adults.
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That's not to say it didn't
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happen for children.
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But the key to writing for younger readers
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is the way in which you draw
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them into the story.
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And so that's the emphasis.
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How do you reach out and
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grab a young reader and
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pull them into the story?
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And so it's about the
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writing craft itself.
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You're dealing with plot,
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you're dealing with structure,
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and you're dealing with the
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transformation of a character.
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And you have the book, A Long Time Coming,
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that's done in verse.
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And I'm wondering if you approach,
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is this also a book in
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verse or is this told through prose?
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No, it's The Forgottenness Through Verse.
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Okay, interesting, interesting.
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And again,
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that's a way for me to engage
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young readers.
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Can I ask why?
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I mean, it works.
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I'm just curious of your choice of that.
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Well, think of...
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Think in terms when we were young readers,
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And think of your
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grandchildren or young readers today,
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what the many options that they have, um,
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whether it's video games or
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so-called screen time or
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graphic novels or organized sports,
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there's so much competition
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for their time.
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Right.
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And, um,
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so the purpose in writing to first
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is a way to quickly grab, um,
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grab the reader, as I said earlier,
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and pull them into the story.
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And you can have really
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important questions in a
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succinct way that hopefully
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will stop them to consider.
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It lets them fill in a lot.
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I mean, you already cited Emerson,
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who captured that in verse,
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and we know about Longfellow and
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More recently,
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we've had the example of
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Hamilton telling the story
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in a way other than prose.
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Yes.
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Yes.
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And Hamilton's, you know,
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the Broadway play is an excellent,
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excellent example.
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Yeah.
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And again,
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but what I'm attempting to do is
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what I do is it's nonfiction.
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It's based on confirmed facts.
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It's richly researched fiction.
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and then condensed in a way
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to attract the reader.
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Right.
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So your nine-year-old actually existed.
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Oh, yes.
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Abel Benson,
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he rode bareback on a horse
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from Framingham all the way
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to Newton playing his
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grandfather's trumpet.
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Wow.
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And calling, as I say,
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calling farmers from their
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morning chores.
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Well, that's an extraordinary image,
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extraordinary story about the ride,
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the trumpet.
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Yes.
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And so let me ask the inevitable question,
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why haven't we heard of
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Abel Benson and this ride
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more frequently?
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Well,
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it goes to the question of a lot of...
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A lot about American history,
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and particularly of people of color,
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it's been ignored,
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certainly not included.
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I don't want to,
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but I think that's the best
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way to describe it.
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And if you think in terms of school books,
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there's a way in which we
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gain our common and shared
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knowledge of history.
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of our country and of our history.
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And the school books are broad strokes.
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And so it's always a
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question of what can be covered.
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Yeah.
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Yeah,
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there's a limited amount of things
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that you can cover.
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And so who are some of the
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other characters you've
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identified in The Forgotten
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that are going to be
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profiled or featured in the
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way you tell the story?
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Well, Prince Estabrook would be one,
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and Peter Salem.
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Those are,
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and a woman by the name of Violet Thayer,
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who was enslaved in the Hartwell Tavern.
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And of course, as you know,
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the Hartwell building,
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a tavern still stands today
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on Battle Road.
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So those are some.
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So you're focusing on the
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events of April nineteenth.
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But then again,
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the war goes on for eight
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years and these folks have
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long lives after.
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Have you found much on what
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happens to them afterward?
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Well,
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they all served in the Continental
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Army and for short periods of time.
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and then returned in case of
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prince estabrook for
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instance which who is most
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documented um returned to
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lexington um returned to um
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his owner even though by
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that time he was a freed
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person and lived with the
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esther brooks um for for
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the rest of his life
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including um when his
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the uh esther brooke the
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older esther brooke's son
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moved to ashby uh
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massachusetts to become a
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minister uh prince went
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with him and is buried in
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the the church cemetery
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there in in ashby we're
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talking with ray anthony
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shepherd award-winning
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biographer and his book the
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forgotten patriots of color
00:10:18.894 --> 00:10:20.875
at lexington and concord is going to be
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due out in February of twenty twenty six.
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So we look forward to that.
00:10:27.394 --> 00:10:29.434
So you are on the Mass.
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Two fiftieth commission and live,
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of course,
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in the historic town of Lincoln.
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Is that what made you think
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about doing a book about
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the American Revolution?
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For sure.
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I mean,
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I live less than a mile from the
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Minuteman Park or Battle Road.
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um and I'm often in
00:10:49.499 --> 00:10:51.059
lexington and so when you
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drive uh down bedford road
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and uh um and then along
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the metaman trail you see
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and of course into
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lexington you see busloads
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and busloads of tourists
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right and so you think what
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are they really being code
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and what do they really know
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as they stand there looking
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in front of the statue of
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the minute man or they walk
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over to the monument to the
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seven who were buried there
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maybe they go across the
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street and they'll see the
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stone marker for prince
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esther brooke but if they
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go into if they go into the
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Visitor Center and look at the diorama,
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there's no mention of Estabrook.
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And so there's the question,
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the diorama of nineteen
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sixty-four to the engraving on the stone,
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which is, I think, in nineteen ninety,
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shows the sort of progression,
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if you like,
00:11:59.250 --> 00:12:01.011
of awareness and of knowledge,
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acknowledgement.
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So that's what I'm trying to do.
00:12:06.515 --> 00:12:07.275
I want people,
00:12:07.856 --> 00:12:09.758
the hundreds of thousands of
00:12:09.817 --> 00:12:11.399
people who are coming into
00:12:11.458 --> 00:12:13.620
Massachusetts at Lexington
00:12:13.640 --> 00:12:16.182
and Concord and walking along the road,
00:12:16.283 --> 00:12:17.803
I want them to know that
00:12:19.904 --> 00:12:23.107
these patriots were there as well.
00:12:24.048 --> 00:12:26.769
And they fought for not only
00:12:27.230 --> 00:12:29.312
to be free of a king,
00:12:29.672 --> 00:12:31.533
but to be free of slavery.
00:12:33.359 --> 00:12:35.301
Do we know what inspired
00:12:35.321 --> 00:12:36.442
them or what motivated them?
00:12:36.501 --> 00:12:37.682
And that's the big question
00:12:37.702 --> 00:12:38.624
historians are always
00:12:38.703 --> 00:12:40.005
asking about anyone who is
00:12:40.046 --> 00:12:41.106
serving and what's the
00:12:41.147 --> 00:12:42.748
motivation and then how do
00:12:42.768 --> 00:12:45.671
you create it in the book?
00:12:45.711 --> 00:12:45.890
Well,
00:12:46.032 --> 00:12:50.035
I think it's as Phyllis Wheatley said,
00:12:51.517 --> 00:12:53.178
God has implanted in the
00:12:55.018 --> 00:12:57.960
breasts of a heart of humans
00:12:58.081 --> 00:13:00.182
this principle of freedom
00:13:02.485 --> 00:13:04.407
and I just it's obviously
00:13:04.527 --> 00:13:08.811
universal and so whether you're
00:13:12.602 --> 00:13:15.583
enslaved or not this desire freedom.
00:13:15.703 --> 00:13:18.645
And imagine you're living in a household,
00:13:18.686 --> 00:13:19.285
you're enslaved,
00:13:19.306 --> 00:13:19.966
you're living in a
00:13:20.046 --> 00:13:24.207
household and people are talking,
00:13:24.248 --> 00:13:25.509
your owners are talking
00:13:25.589 --> 00:13:28.049
about they're not going to
00:13:28.129 --> 00:13:29.931
pay taxes means they're
00:13:29.990 --> 00:13:31.630
going to be British slaves.
00:13:31.912 --> 00:13:32.871
And you're thinking about
00:13:32.912 --> 00:13:35.113
your own situation, your own status.
00:13:37.854 --> 00:13:39.815
We're talking with Ray Anthony Shepherd,
00:13:39.835 --> 00:13:41.155
award-winning biographer
00:13:41.196 --> 00:13:41.956
for young readers.
00:13:42.375 --> 00:13:43.456
Now, I'm wondering,
00:13:44.255 --> 00:13:46.037
who are some of the writers
00:13:46.077 --> 00:13:48.139
you read as a youth or a
00:13:48.178 --> 00:13:49.820
young person that inspired
00:13:49.879 --> 00:13:51.240
you on the track toward
00:13:51.341 --> 00:13:52.282
exploring history?
00:13:53.282 --> 00:13:55.943
Well, there's the challenge.
00:13:57.404 --> 00:14:02.567
As someone who qualifies as
00:14:02.587 --> 00:14:06.051
a super senior citizen, the books
00:14:07.107 --> 00:14:08.629
that the type of books that
00:14:08.729 --> 00:14:10.028
I wanted to read or the
00:14:10.590 --> 00:14:13.211
type of books that I write didn't exist.
00:14:16.212 --> 00:14:17.812
I was a graduate student
00:14:18.214 --> 00:14:20.254
before I came in contact
00:14:20.274 --> 00:14:26.937
with any book written by a Black author.
00:14:26.957 --> 00:14:29.239
So that tells you a lot.
00:14:29.298 --> 00:14:30.580
And I went to a university
00:14:30.639 --> 00:14:31.620
laboratory school.
00:14:33.480 --> 00:14:36.383
And no, nothing.
00:14:37.951 --> 00:14:39.652
And you encountered Paul
00:14:39.692 --> 00:14:42.293
Laurence Dunbar or Langston Hughes,
00:14:43.072 --> 00:14:45.693
but you did, that was in church, no less,
00:14:47.894 --> 00:14:50.715
rather than in school.
00:14:51.174 --> 00:14:52.475
One of the books you did
00:14:52.654 --> 00:14:54.115
earlier on in your career
00:14:54.335 --> 00:14:56.576
was Charles W. Chestnut's
00:14:56.596 --> 00:14:57.596
The Conjure Tales.
00:14:57.615 --> 00:14:59.115
Can you tell us a little bit about that?
00:14:59.976 --> 00:15:01.836
Chestnut was a fascinating author.
00:15:02.657 --> 00:15:03.017
Yes.
00:15:03.738 --> 00:15:05.460
Why, you have done your research.
00:15:06.681 --> 00:15:07.822
Very few people know about
00:15:07.861 --> 00:15:09.403
that particular book.
00:15:10.664 --> 00:15:15.208
Chestnut is, and it's been a while,
00:15:15.288 --> 00:15:16.090
so bear with me.
00:15:16.110 --> 00:15:16.951
Okay.
00:15:16.971 --> 00:15:20.394
But you had Joe Tamra Harris
00:15:20.634 --> 00:15:23.957
and others who were writing about
00:15:25.355 --> 00:15:27.655
blocks in a comical way.
00:15:28.317 --> 00:15:31.956
And Chestnut is doing just the reverse.
00:15:32.917 --> 00:15:35.597
And so what I liked about
00:15:35.697 --> 00:15:39.178
the book was called Conjure Women.
00:15:39.818 --> 00:15:41.558
And what I liked about it
00:15:41.639 --> 00:15:46.399
was this reversal, if you like.
00:15:47.500 --> 00:15:49.660
And so I retold that book
00:15:49.701 --> 00:15:50.860
for young readers.
00:15:53.052 --> 00:15:56.413
And just as a way to get at
00:15:57.234 --> 00:15:59.214
what I think are wonderful,
00:15:59.514 --> 00:16:01.355
wonderful tales, folk tales.
00:16:01.674 --> 00:16:01.855
Yes.
00:16:01.875 --> 00:16:04.154
And so that was a purpose.
00:16:04.174 --> 00:16:05.375
Right.
00:16:05.455 --> 00:16:05.774
Yeah.
00:16:05.794 --> 00:16:07.316
Chestnut, for those who don't know,
00:16:07.416 --> 00:16:10.775
was a journalist, writer, late-nineteenth,
00:16:10.816 --> 00:16:12.236
early-twentieth century,
00:16:12.317 --> 00:16:14.076
wrote tremendous short stories,
00:16:14.277 --> 00:16:16.057
really documenting this
00:16:16.096 --> 00:16:17.778
experience of this moment, you know,
00:16:18.357 --> 00:16:20.418
reconstruction, post-reconstruction.
00:16:21.240 --> 00:16:22.120
He had one short story,
00:16:22.140 --> 00:16:23.341
The Passing of Grandison,
00:16:23.360 --> 00:16:24.241
that I thought could be
00:16:24.282 --> 00:16:25.142
made into a movie.
00:16:25.221 --> 00:16:26.663
It's kind of a reversal of a
00:16:26.702 --> 00:16:27.423
lot of things.
00:16:27.624 --> 00:16:28.644
That's one of his real themes,
00:16:28.663 --> 00:16:30.946
is this reversal of roles and identities.
00:16:31.605 --> 00:16:32.986
Right.
00:16:33.067 --> 00:16:34.008
And it's interesting that
00:16:34.048 --> 00:16:35.828
we're talking about reversal of roles.
00:16:35.889 --> 00:16:37.210
Think of Percival.
00:16:38.210 --> 00:16:40.071
Everett right now with James,
00:16:43.511 --> 00:16:45.332
it's interesting that this
00:16:45.493 --> 00:16:47.232
concept or theme, if you like,
00:16:47.293 --> 00:16:51.654
or approach is still alive and well.
00:16:52.774 --> 00:16:55.916
And Chestnut is one of the
00:16:56.076 --> 00:16:57.937
originators of it.
00:16:57.956 --> 00:16:58.496
It really is, yeah.
00:16:59.403 --> 00:16:59.562
I mean,
00:16:59.602 --> 00:17:01.563
if you don't mind continuing on
00:17:02.085 --> 00:17:04.766
memory lane, you also wrote a novel,
00:17:04.826 --> 00:17:07.607
Sneakers, again about basketball.
00:17:09.729 --> 00:17:11.369
You have done too much research.
00:17:14.070 --> 00:17:15.451
Those books are written many,
00:17:15.531 --> 00:17:16.492
many years ago.
00:17:18.513 --> 00:17:18.953
Actually,
00:17:18.993 --> 00:17:21.355
when I was a graduate student at
00:17:21.414 --> 00:17:25.758
Harvard and I was thinking
00:17:25.798 --> 00:17:27.358
about writing as a career,
00:17:28.689 --> 00:17:33.633
But then reality took over.
00:17:34.294 --> 00:17:37.236
I called them mortgage, marriage, children,
00:17:37.256 --> 00:17:40.698
et cetera.
00:17:40.718 --> 00:17:42.920
And I went to work in
00:17:43.079 --> 00:17:44.340
educational publishing.
00:17:46.663 --> 00:17:48.064
And then since retiring,
00:17:48.663 --> 00:17:50.105
I've had a chance in the
00:17:50.164 --> 00:17:52.727
last ten years to come back to writing.
00:17:53.587 --> 00:17:56.789
And the three recent books that I've
00:17:58.240 --> 00:17:59.903
did since retirement.
00:18:00.242 --> 00:18:01.805
Great, great.
00:18:01.825 --> 00:18:03.807
So we're talking with Ray Anthony Shepard,
00:18:03.826 --> 00:18:05.627
who has become a prolific
00:18:05.647 --> 00:18:07.711
writer of books for young audiences.
00:18:07.750 --> 00:18:09.873
And your book, A Long Time Coming,
00:18:10.053 --> 00:18:11.614
is a lyrical biography of
00:18:11.673 --> 00:18:13.175
race in America from Ona
00:18:13.215 --> 00:18:15.117
Judge to Barack Obama.
00:18:15.298 --> 00:18:16.439
It received the Julia Ward
00:18:16.459 --> 00:18:19.122
Howe Prize for children's older readers,
00:18:19.162 --> 00:18:20.942
as well as a school library
00:18:21.002 --> 00:18:22.484
journal best book.
00:18:22.833 --> 00:18:24.755
And that does tell the story
00:18:24.775 --> 00:18:26.036
of America from a somewhat
00:18:26.096 --> 00:18:28.116
different perspective, Ona Judge.
00:18:28.897 --> 00:18:29.577
And why don't we talk a
00:18:29.597 --> 00:18:30.798
little bit about Ona Judge
00:18:30.818 --> 00:18:32.740
and who she was and why she is important?
00:18:32.760 --> 00:18:32.901
Right.
00:18:33.541 --> 00:18:35.702
Well, she is.
00:18:37.135 --> 00:18:39.156
If you think in terms of as
00:18:39.196 --> 00:18:41.778
we approach the America to
00:18:41.798 --> 00:18:44.161
fifty and we think of
00:18:44.520 --> 00:18:45.981
seventeen seventy six,
00:18:46.201 --> 00:18:48.963
she's a young lady who we
00:18:48.983 --> 00:18:50.045
believe was born in
00:18:50.724 --> 00:18:52.746
seventeen seventy three.
00:18:54.267 --> 00:18:57.349
She she's enslaved by she's
00:18:57.410 --> 00:18:59.651
part of Martha Washington's estate.
00:19:02.015 --> 00:19:04.415
And she's in the household
00:19:04.675 --> 00:19:06.217
of George and Martha
00:19:06.277 --> 00:19:07.718
Washington in Mount Vernon
00:19:08.218 --> 00:19:10.058
when she's sixteen years old.
00:19:10.739 --> 00:19:12.140
She is Martha.
00:19:12.500 --> 00:19:14.480
She's Martha's seamstress
00:19:15.161 --> 00:19:16.422
and personal servant.
00:19:17.321 --> 00:19:19.042
She brings her to New York
00:19:20.442 --> 00:19:21.743
and then eventually and
00:19:21.763 --> 00:19:23.085
then to Philadelphia.
00:19:23.704 --> 00:19:25.144
And by the time she's twenty
00:19:25.204 --> 00:19:27.326
three and the Washingtons
00:19:27.365 --> 00:19:30.067
or George Washington is about to retire,
00:19:30.928 --> 00:19:31.887
she decides,
00:19:31.968 --> 00:19:36.710
rather than going back to Virginia,
00:19:36.789 --> 00:19:40.691
to Mount Vernon, she'd rather escape.
00:19:42.291 --> 00:19:44.412
And through black
00:19:44.471 --> 00:19:45.553
abolitionists and white
00:19:45.613 --> 00:19:48.374
abolitionists in Philadelphia,
00:19:48.733 --> 00:19:51.535
she is able to carry her
00:19:51.595 --> 00:19:54.454
clothes and hide them in one house.
00:19:55.076 --> 00:19:55.935
And eventually,
00:19:56.056 --> 00:19:57.736
as the Washingtons sit down
00:19:57.776 --> 00:19:58.896
for their early dinner,
00:19:59.656 --> 00:20:00.877
One night in May,
00:20:01.317 --> 00:20:06.141
she leaves and stays hidden
00:20:06.340 --> 00:20:08.442
for a while and eventually
00:20:08.702 --> 00:20:10.963
is on a boat that sails
00:20:10.983 --> 00:20:13.605
from Philadelphia to Portsmouth,
00:20:14.125 --> 00:20:14.726
New Hampshire,
00:20:14.766 --> 00:20:17.508
where she will spend the next fifty-two,
00:20:17.548 --> 00:20:19.269
fifty-four years of her life.
00:20:22.851 --> 00:20:27.554
Ironically, New Hampshire builds itself as
00:20:28.701 --> 00:20:29.862
live free or die.
00:20:30.962 --> 00:20:35.186
She certainly lived free and died there,
00:20:35.928 --> 00:20:36.647
lived free.
00:20:37.669 --> 00:20:40.951
She survived two attempts by
00:20:41.051 --> 00:20:43.714
the Washingtons to recapture her.
00:20:45.814 --> 00:20:50.237
So in the book for younger readers,
00:20:50.518 --> 00:20:51.178
Runaway,
00:20:51.838 --> 00:20:54.780
I focus just on the day in which
00:20:55.181 --> 00:20:58.844
she escapes.
00:20:58.963 --> 00:20:59.984
In Long Time Coming,
00:21:00.065 --> 00:21:02.606
I tell her life from cradle to grave.
00:21:03.493 --> 00:21:04.634
And it's a harsh life.
00:21:05.173 --> 00:21:06.295
And it goes back to the
00:21:06.355 --> 00:21:08.154
question that you asked earlier.
00:21:08.394 --> 00:21:09.234
And that is,
00:21:09.694 --> 00:21:11.056
what happened to these guys
00:21:11.715 --> 00:21:13.816
who fought in the revolution?
00:21:13.855 --> 00:21:14.876
What happened to them when
00:21:14.916 --> 00:21:15.696
the war was over?
00:21:15.936 --> 00:21:17.037
Those who survived.
00:21:18.356 --> 00:21:20.657
And it goes to the question,
00:21:21.617 --> 00:21:25.919
if you are to be,
00:21:26.878 --> 00:21:28.159
even though you're to be a
00:21:28.259 --> 00:21:30.359
free black with
00:21:31.916 --> 00:21:40.320
limited assets, unable to read or write,
00:21:41.182 --> 00:21:42.021
what's your future?
00:21:43.762 --> 00:21:44.923
And not to mention the
00:21:47.125 --> 00:21:48.445
social environment in which
00:21:48.465 --> 00:21:49.105
you're living.
00:21:49.846 --> 00:21:52.988
And so for Ona in New Hampshire,
00:21:53.728 --> 00:21:54.528
it was a struggle.
00:21:55.430 --> 00:21:57.131
Um, even she married,
00:21:57.730 --> 00:21:58.791
she eventually learned to
00:21:58.832 --> 00:22:01.032
read a bit primarily so
00:22:01.073 --> 00:22:02.354
that she could read the Bible,
00:22:03.034 --> 00:22:04.134
but it was a hard life.
00:22:05.174 --> 00:22:05.275
Uh,
00:22:05.394 --> 00:22:06.796
two of her daughters died from
00:22:06.836 --> 00:22:07.695
malnutrition.
00:22:09.777 --> 00:22:11.617
It was a tough life, but again,
00:22:12.239 --> 00:22:13.419
we go back to the question
00:22:13.439 --> 00:22:14.960
you asked earlier.
00:22:15.039 --> 00:22:16.421
Why, why, why?
00:22:17.656 --> 00:22:20.720
Why, why, why, why do people,
00:22:20.960 --> 00:22:22.121
why did they run away?
00:22:22.240 --> 00:22:22.902
Why did they?
00:22:23.603 --> 00:22:24.804
And they're, they're seeking,
00:22:24.983 --> 00:22:27.987
they're seeking that universal freedom.
00:22:28.186 --> 00:22:28.907
Right, right.
00:22:29.888 --> 00:22:32.030
And they're willing to pay the price.
00:22:32.171 --> 00:22:32.412
Yeah.
00:22:33.071 --> 00:22:34.012
It's an amazing story.
00:22:34.073 --> 00:22:35.795
I mean, all of these are amazing stories.
00:22:35.875 --> 00:22:36.955
And the story of the
00:22:37.016 --> 00:22:38.298
revolution is amazing in
00:22:38.337 --> 00:22:40.500
many ways for that reason, without even
00:22:41.007 --> 00:22:41.826
beginning with Phyllis
00:22:41.866 --> 00:22:44.087
Wheatley about that love of
00:22:44.127 --> 00:22:46.509
freedom implanted in every human breast.
00:22:46.609 --> 00:22:48.369
And this is emanating.
00:22:49.770 --> 00:22:52.372
Jonathan Arlene, our executive director,
00:22:52.392 --> 00:22:53.633
just reminded me of the
00:22:53.692 --> 00:22:55.733
series of The Childhood of
00:22:55.773 --> 00:22:56.794
Famous Americans,
00:22:56.814 --> 00:22:58.355
a series of kind of
00:22:58.414 --> 00:22:59.736
childhood biographies aimed
00:22:59.756 --> 00:23:00.536
at young readers.
00:23:01.436 --> 00:23:02.517
Really wondering,
00:23:02.636 --> 00:23:03.897
as we're approaching the
00:23:03.938 --> 00:23:05.458
two hundred fiftieth, you know,
00:23:05.678 --> 00:23:07.019
what will come out of this?
00:23:07.078 --> 00:23:09.038
Can you envision a series like this?
00:23:09.078 --> 00:23:09.219
I mean,
00:23:09.239 --> 00:23:10.338
I'm not saying you should now
00:23:10.359 --> 00:23:11.759
embark on this,
00:23:11.819 --> 00:23:13.019
but is this something that
00:23:13.039 --> 00:23:15.421
you think we could do or is
00:23:15.441 --> 00:23:18.801
this telling these stories
00:23:19.021 --> 00:23:21.122
and how you would engage people,
00:23:21.863 --> 00:23:22.903
writers like you,
00:23:23.022 --> 00:23:24.682
even if you're coming back
00:23:24.722 --> 00:23:25.983
to writing after a long
00:23:26.023 --> 00:23:27.344
hiatus of paying the
00:23:27.384 --> 00:23:28.664
mortgage and raising a family?
00:23:31.214 --> 00:23:32.296
reaching young audiences
00:23:32.316 --> 00:23:33.477
seems like a critical thing.
00:23:33.717 --> 00:23:35.018
And I really applaud you for
00:23:35.058 --> 00:23:37.039
doing it and doing it in a
00:23:37.520 --> 00:23:38.942
really successful way.
00:23:39.342 --> 00:23:40.063
Do you think this is
00:23:40.103 --> 00:23:41.564
something that maybe some of the Mass.
00:23:41.584 --> 00:23:42.424
two-fifty or other
00:23:42.464 --> 00:23:43.586
two-fiftieth group should
00:23:43.625 --> 00:23:45.147
look at creating these
00:23:45.188 --> 00:23:47.710
kinds of stories for younger audiences?
00:23:49.710 --> 00:23:51.250
Well, it's a good question.
00:23:51.612 --> 00:23:53.613
And I hesitate because I'm
00:23:53.673 --> 00:23:55.954
thinking of there are some
00:23:56.035 --> 00:23:57.856
popular series right now
00:23:57.916 --> 00:23:59.357
called I Survive.
00:23:59.817 --> 00:24:02.259
And so I'm almost like that
00:24:02.319 --> 00:24:03.961
Scholastic publishes or
00:24:03.981 --> 00:24:07.084
there's another series, She Persisted,
00:24:07.124 --> 00:24:08.244
which is about women.
00:24:08.265 --> 00:24:14.089
And so as I talk here, I'm thinking, yes,
00:24:14.150 --> 00:24:15.270
it's a great idea.
00:24:17.172 --> 00:24:18.973
If a publisher can...
00:24:19.752 --> 00:24:24.354
plug them into their ongoing, two options,
00:24:24.534 --> 00:24:25.894
into their ongoing series
00:24:26.075 --> 00:24:28.535
or a separate series.
00:24:29.075 --> 00:24:31.836
But we do have successful series going on.
00:24:31.935 --> 00:24:32.915
And as I said,
00:24:32.976 --> 00:24:39.137
She Persisted or the books called Who Was,
00:24:40.617 --> 00:24:42.078
et cetera, et cetera, et cetera,
00:24:43.159 --> 00:24:45.619
or indeed the Scholastic series,
00:24:45.740 --> 00:24:46.519
I Survived.
00:24:47.155 --> 00:24:48.317
Yeah.
00:24:48.356 --> 00:24:48.997
Some of them, I mean,
00:24:49.057 --> 00:24:50.577
I don't want to criticize people.
00:24:50.778 --> 00:24:52.480
A lot of them just are too
00:24:52.599 --> 00:24:54.201
more preachy than storytelling.
00:24:54.580 --> 00:24:55.381
Right.
00:24:55.461 --> 00:24:55.882
Yeah.
00:24:55.961 --> 00:24:56.662
Yeah, absolutely.
00:24:58.282 --> 00:25:00.625
And that's a whole trick.
00:25:00.644 --> 00:25:00.984
Yeah.
00:25:01.826 --> 00:25:05.248
And a little trade talk here.
00:25:06.528 --> 00:25:07.288
Sometimes there's a
00:25:07.328 --> 00:25:10.510
difference between a work
00:25:10.530 --> 00:25:13.874
for hire and a trade book.
00:25:14.894 --> 00:25:15.013
Yeah.
00:25:15.094 --> 00:25:15.474
That is...
00:25:16.796 --> 00:25:17.916
Those of us who write for
00:25:17.977 --> 00:25:20.377
royalties as opposed to a flat fee,
00:25:22.058 --> 00:25:24.099
I'd like to believe we
00:25:24.140 --> 00:25:27.842
write for art or for the
00:25:27.942 --> 00:25:32.223
craft as opposed to meeting
00:25:32.263 --> 00:25:33.585
an artificial deadline.
00:25:34.904 --> 00:25:38.386
But I know I'm sounding self-serving here.
00:25:38.467 --> 00:25:41.208
I apologize for that.
00:25:41.228 --> 00:25:41.307
Well,
00:25:41.328 --> 00:25:43.249
I always remember what Samuel Johnson
00:25:43.309 --> 00:25:44.269
said about no one but a
00:25:44.289 --> 00:25:46.151
blockhead ever wrote except for money.
00:25:49.268 --> 00:25:50.367
Yeah, for sure.
00:25:51.147 --> 00:25:52.989
But the main thing that I
00:25:53.028 --> 00:25:56.671
think really what we want, here's sort of,
00:25:56.770 --> 00:25:58.112
if you like, my purpose,
00:25:58.132 --> 00:26:00.532
and especially in thinking
00:26:00.613 --> 00:26:01.873
of America Two-Fifty.
00:26:03.354 --> 00:26:03.753
Again,
00:26:04.134 --> 00:26:08.355
think in terms of the idea that
00:26:08.415 --> 00:26:09.457
shared knowledge
00:26:10.419 --> 00:26:12.580
shared appreciation of American history.
00:26:13.141 --> 00:26:15.123
There's a cohesiveness about
00:26:15.202 --> 00:26:19.826
it for us as a people.
00:26:21.468 --> 00:26:25.010
And what we lack in terms of
00:26:25.652 --> 00:26:27.894
our understanding of American history,
00:26:28.314 --> 00:26:29.095
we celebrate
00:26:29.703 --> 00:26:30.924
the American Revolution
00:26:30.964 --> 00:26:35.166
without giving deep thought
00:26:35.248 --> 00:26:37.449
to what was it,
00:26:37.888 --> 00:26:40.151
what did it mean that you
00:26:40.191 --> 00:26:42.551
can fight for freedom at the same time,
00:26:42.711 --> 00:26:43.853
enslave someone.
00:26:44.713 --> 00:26:47.535
And so that, and we've never really,
00:26:47.634 --> 00:26:49.557
in fact, two hundred fifty years later,
00:26:49.616 --> 00:26:51.657
we're still dealing in many ways,
00:26:51.738 --> 00:26:52.878
dealing with that issue.
00:26:53.459 --> 00:26:54.819
How is it possible?
00:26:56.838 --> 00:26:59.140
that these two things can
00:26:59.220 --> 00:27:00.920
exist simultaneously.
00:27:02.320 --> 00:27:06.242
And it's going back to Jefferson,
00:27:06.363 --> 00:27:08.343
Thomas Jefferson quote,
00:27:08.482 --> 00:27:10.163
slavery is like holding a
00:27:10.263 --> 00:27:11.345
whoop by the ears.
00:27:13.005 --> 00:27:15.665
Do you hold on or do you let go?
00:27:16.666 --> 00:27:20.468
And as I said, in many ways,
00:27:20.508 --> 00:27:21.648
we're still dealing with that.
00:27:22.526 --> 00:27:22.826
We are.
00:27:22.846 --> 00:27:23.786
And it's one of the things
00:27:23.806 --> 00:27:24.586
that makes it so
00:27:24.625 --> 00:27:27.346
fascinating is that it has
00:27:27.406 --> 00:27:30.087
that contradiction at the center.
00:27:30.147 --> 00:27:32.188
And I think getting kids to
00:27:32.228 --> 00:27:33.528
grapple with this,
00:27:33.647 --> 00:27:35.888
it can be either horrific
00:27:35.929 --> 00:27:37.848
for them or it can help
00:27:37.868 --> 00:27:39.569
them think about history in
00:27:39.589 --> 00:27:40.329
a broader way.
00:27:40.490 --> 00:27:42.349
It's really one of the real
00:27:42.470 --> 00:27:43.971
predicaments we have as historians,
00:27:44.010 --> 00:27:44.951
as well as a predicament we
00:27:44.971 --> 00:27:45.651
have as a nation.
00:27:46.574 --> 00:27:48.013
Yes,
00:27:48.314 --> 00:27:51.255
and it's become intensified to the
00:27:51.275 --> 00:27:54.695
degree in which there's a
00:27:55.115 --> 00:27:59.336
heightened sensitivity of
00:27:59.696 --> 00:28:00.636
what should be taught,
00:28:00.957 --> 00:28:02.577
what books should be allowed in,
00:28:02.637 --> 00:28:03.738
what books should be
00:28:04.678 --> 00:28:06.298
discouraged or banned.
00:28:07.038 --> 00:28:12.259
And so that becomes... And that becomes...
00:28:14.048 --> 00:28:17.089
a great self-censorship on
00:28:17.130 --> 00:28:19.692
the part of teachers and librarians.
00:28:20.472 --> 00:28:21.973
Do you have a book like
00:28:22.013 --> 00:28:24.555
Runaway or Now or Never or
00:28:24.734 --> 00:28:25.836
A Long Time Coming, which
00:28:27.267 --> 00:28:28.827
Do you really want to teach
00:28:28.847 --> 00:28:30.909
that in the schools or will
00:28:30.949 --> 00:28:32.410
that some parent complain
00:28:32.470 --> 00:28:35.372
or will some self-appointed
00:28:36.833 --> 00:28:38.394
person decide that that
00:28:38.433 --> 00:28:39.674
book is inappropriate?
00:28:40.295 --> 00:28:42.376
Or as the words being used,
00:28:42.817 --> 00:28:45.097
it'll make our children uncomfortable.
00:28:46.835 --> 00:28:48.536
And then on the other side, Ray,
00:28:48.576 --> 00:28:51.557
we have this taking down of
00:28:51.616 --> 00:28:53.857
names and statues and so on.
00:28:54.077 --> 00:28:56.259
I'm not talking about the Confederates,
00:28:56.298 --> 00:28:57.479
but I'm talking about Washington,
00:28:57.538 --> 00:29:00.319
Jefferson, and how we grapple with that.
00:29:00.359 --> 00:29:02.300
I mean, these guys had very deep flaws.
00:29:02.621 --> 00:29:04.201
And, you know,
00:29:04.241 --> 00:29:06.522
George and Martha in Runaway
00:29:06.563 --> 00:29:08.324
are probably quite
00:29:08.344 --> 00:29:09.943
different from the George
00:29:09.963 --> 00:29:12.025
and Martha of the Pantheon.
00:29:12.607 --> 00:29:15.528
But I'm wondering how we come back to this,
00:29:15.648 --> 00:29:17.670
the sense of common
00:29:17.710 --> 00:29:20.851
identity you were talking about earlier.
00:29:20.971 --> 00:29:24.012
Well, I think no one,
00:29:24.853 --> 00:29:29.815
we have to start with things change.
00:29:31.976 --> 00:29:33.476
There was a day in which
00:29:34.457 --> 00:29:35.576
so-called witches were
00:29:35.616 --> 00:29:36.576
burned at the stake.
00:29:39.833 --> 00:29:41.454
So the question is,
00:29:41.494 --> 00:29:43.537
how do we celebrate human progress?
00:29:45.078 --> 00:29:46.140
How do we celebrate,
00:29:47.080 --> 00:29:48.102
how do we acknowledge
00:29:48.201 --> 00:29:53.208
social progress without saying, oh,
00:29:53.327 --> 00:29:55.029
we can't teach George Washington
00:29:56.970 --> 00:29:58.349
We can't appreciate his
00:29:58.451 --> 00:30:00.531
genius as a military leader.
00:30:01.211 --> 00:30:02.752
We can't appreciate his
00:30:02.893 --> 00:30:04.374
struggling with the whole
00:30:04.534 --> 00:30:06.253
issue of when he arrives in
00:30:06.294 --> 00:30:10.757
Cambridge and he sees black
00:30:10.797 --> 00:30:13.397
soldiers and he's thinking
00:30:13.417 --> 00:30:14.679
of his slaves back at Mount
00:30:14.699 --> 00:30:16.159
Vernon and he doesn't want
00:30:16.180 --> 00:30:16.980
them in the army,
00:30:17.380 --> 00:30:19.000
yet he has a responsibility
00:30:19.040 --> 00:30:21.842
to win the war and eventually changes.
00:30:21.862 --> 00:30:22.782
And
00:30:25.248 --> 00:30:28.548
I think we have to help
00:30:28.888 --> 00:30:30.509
young readers understand
00:30:31.890 --> 00:30:37.132
the dilemma that so many
00:30:37.152 --> 00:30:38.472
people found themselves in
00:30:39.472 --> 00:30:40.532
and continue to find
00:30:40.553 --> 00:30:44.714
themselves in as we move into the next,
00:30:45.474 --> 00:30:46.154
God willing,
00:30:46.214 --> 00:30:49.336
the next two hundred and fifty years.
00:30:49.375 --> 00:30:51.416
We're talking with Ray Anthony Shepherd,
00:30:51.436 --> 00:30:52.837
award-winning biographer
00:30:52.857 --> 00:30:53.837
for young readers.
00:30:54.473 --> 00:30:56.634
He has just completed the manuscript,
00:30:56.674 --> 00:30:58.155
The Forgotten Patriots of
00:30:58.195 --> 00:31:00.176
Color at Lexington and Concord,
00:31:00.717 --> 00:31:02.478
which tells the story, you know,
00:31:02.498 --> 00:31:06.019
just one day in Lexington and Concord,
00:31:06.059 --> 00:31:07.421
what happens in the course
00:31:07.661 --> 00:31:09.961
of that battle and really
00:31:10.061 --> 00:31:12.042
focusing on the
00:31:12.242 --> 00:31:13.644
African-Americans who were
00:31:13.703 --> 00:31:15.684
fighting at Lexington and Concord.
00:31:17.925 --> 00:31:21.387
And you've mentioned a couple, Abel Benson,
00:31:21.448 --> 00:31:23.509
Princess de Brooke, Peter Salem.
00:31:23.968 --> 00:31:25.750
who play really interesting
00:31:25.809 --> 00:31:28.172
roles that day and then go on to serve.
00:31:28.511 --> 00:31:30.453
I'm wondering how you
00:31:31.035 --> 00:31:32.757
selected these particular
00:31:32.797 --> 00:31:35.880
guys and Violet Thayer to focus on.
00:31:35.980 --> 00:31:39.103
It seems they're on the one hand obvious,
00:31:39.143 --> 00:31:39.923
but on the other hand,
00:31:40.084 --> 00:31:41.325
each of them has a certain
00:31:41.404 --> 00:31:43.727
part of the story that he
00:31:43.747 --> 00:31:44.508
or she is sharing.
00:31:46.553 --> 00:31:46.772
Well,
00:31:47.133 --> 00:31:51.396
what I wanted to do is pick the major
00:31:51.416 --> 00:31:53.117
battles of the day.
00:31:53.698 --> 00:31:56.119
So then I have to find an
00:31:56.220 --> 00:31:58.182
individual who was there.
00:31:58.922 --> 00:32:01.044
And so that drove the selection.
00:32:01.584 --> 00:32:03.885
So obviously Princess Brooke
00:32:03.925 --> 00:32:06.347
is an easy one because he's there,
00:32:06.387 --> 00:32:09.329
he's part of the Lexington militia.
00:32:10.651 --> 00:32:12.251
But when we moved to Concord,
00:32:14.288 --> 00:32:15.509
then it becomes harder
00:32:15.709 --> 00:32:18.950
because there are no the
00:32:19.069 --> 00:32:21.230
rosters for both the
00:32:22.250 --> 00:32:24.951
conquered Minutemen and
00:32:25.071 --> 00:32:26.873
militia and the same for Lincoln.
00:32:28.953 --> 00:32:30.615
There are no African,
00:32:30.674 --> 00:32:33.035
no blacks on those rosters.
00:32:33.816 --> 00:32:36.477
So then it becomes harder to
00:32:37.116 --> 00:32:39.557
start digging and you go to
00:32:39.637 --> 00:32:41.878
the fact that there were
00:32:43.652 --> 00:32:45.173
from Bedford and from Concord,
00:32:45.792 --> 00:32:47.193
some of the officers
00:32:47.433 --> 00:32:50.855
brought their black servants with them.
00:32:51.715 --> 00:32:55.278
So that's how you begin to tell the story.
00:32:55.637 --> 00:32:57.358
But mainly what I'm set out
00:32:57.378 --> 00:33:00.680
to do is the British march,
00:33:00.960 --> 00:33:02.020
they reach Lexington.
00:33:02.580 --> 00:33:05.061
They're very confident after
00:33:05.122 --> 00:33:06.563
the battle in Lexington,
00:33:06.623 --> 00:33:07.723
if you call it a battle,
00:33:07.763 --> 00:33:08.443
after the shooting.
00:33:09.203 --> 00:33:10.285
They're confident as they
00:33:10.345 --> 00:33:12.286
march towards Concord.
00:33:13.525 --> 00:33:15.207
and then they're running for
00:33:15.247 --> 00:33:18.009
their lives back to Boston.
00:33:18.348 --> 00:33:19.809
And so I want to tell that,
00:33:19.849 --> 00:33:22.132
so I pick individuals that
00:33:22.751 --> 00:33:26.015
help me tell that story in the sequence.
00:33:26.494 --> 00:33:28.096
Right, right.
00:33:28.136 --> 00:33:29.557
Were there Blacks in the British Army?
00:33:30.278 --> 00:33:31.358
Yes, there were more.
00:33:32.339 --> 00:33:34.559
In fact, there are more loyalists,
00:33:35.140 --> 00:33:37.461
more blacks fought for the
00:33:37.520 --> 00:33:41.481
British than for the
00:33:41.642 --> 00:33:44.242
provisional army or for the patriots.
00:33:44.883 --> 00:33:46.343
It's estimated in the eight
00:33:46.383 --> 00:33:48.223
years that some more than
00:33:48.284 --> 00:33:51.364
six thousand blacks fought
00:33:51.544 --> 00:33:54.125
in the Continental Army.
00:33:54.744 --> 00:33:55.944
And that's one fifth of the
00:33:56.005 --> 00:33:56.865
Continental Army.
00:33:57.066 --> 00:33:57.905
Again, something...
00:33:59.212 --> 00:34:00.933
from textbooks or from our
00:34:00.953 --> 00:34:02.234
shared knowledge, if you like.
00:34:02.895 --> 00:34:04.577
But if you think in terms of
00:34:06.799 --> 00:34:09.581
Dunmar's Ethiopian regiment
00:34:10.262 --> 00:34:15.427
or the number of more blacks felt,
00:34:15.467 --> 00:34:16.588
particularly in the South,
00:34:16.748 --> 00:34:19.751
not in the North and not in New England,
00:34:20.873 --> 00:34:22.494
but they had a better
00:34:22.554 --> 00:34:24.476
chance with the British
00:34:25.014 --> 00:34:26.494
than remaining with their
00:34:26.655 --> 00:34:28.815
owners in South Carolina, Georgia,
00:34:29.016 --> 00:34:30.896
North Carolina, et cetera.
00:34:30.976 --> 00:34:31.418
Right.
00:34:31.538 --> 00:34:34.539
And it's one of those things that, again,
00:34:34.780 --> 00:34:36.500
we should know that the
00:34:36.519 --> 00:34:37.661
percentage of
00:34:37.960 --> 00:34:39.121
African-Americans as part of
00:34:39.141 --> 00:34:40.563
the population was higher
00:34:40.862 --> 00:34:42.103
then than it is today.
00:34:42.704 --> 00:34:44.025
This black presence at the
00:34:44.105 --> 00:34:47.126
time is really worth remembering.
00:34:48.007 --> 00:34:48.246
Yes.
00:34:48.766 --> 00:34:49.168
In fact,
00:34:49.248 --> 00:34:51.148
I think whites were a minority in
00:34:51.208 --> 00:34:52.028
South Carolina.
00:34:52.289 --> 00:34:53.429
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:34:53.947 --> 00:34:55.248
And even if you go into the
00:34:55.268 --> 00:34:57.128
Hartwell Tavern, there is Violet Thayer.
00:34:57.148 --> 00:34:59.110
Yes, yes.
00:35:02.150 --> 00:35:03.490
I'm sorry to keep asking you
00:35:03.530 --> 00:35:05.331
about the writing craft,
00:35:05.351 --> 00:35:06.371
and I'm wondering if in the
00:35:06.411 --> 00:35:07.972
time you were working as an
00:35:08.072 --> 00:35:08.913
editor or teacher,
00:35:08.972 --> 00:35:10.552
if you continue to write verse,
00:35:10.592 --> 00:35:11.833
if poetry is something
00:35:11.853 --> 00:35:13.353
that's been part of your
00:35:13.393 --> 00:35:14.994
life since your early days
00:35:15.034 --> 00:35:15.954
wanting to be a writer.
00:35:20.344 --> 00:35:23.987
Once I started seriously
00:35:24.347 --> 00:35:26.409
focusing on career building,
00:35:27.389 --> 00:35:28.650
there was very little time
00:35:29.190 --> 00:35:30.451
for writing other than
00:35:31.092 --> 00:35:32.632
writing and trying to
00:35:32.693 --> 00:35:35.193
improve the textbooks that
00:35:35.233 --> 00:35:37.235
we were producing.
00:35:40.277 --> 00:35:41.657
I was editor-in-chief of a
00:35:42.038 --> 00:35:43.418
very large company, so...
00:35:46.072 --> 00:35:47.954
There wasn't much time other
00:35:48.994 --> 00:35:52.695
than trying to produce books.
00:35:53.275 --> 00:35:53.436
Now,
00:35:53.536 --> 00:35:59.159
I did try to do more in terms of what
00:35:59.219 --> 00:36:01.579
then was called multicultural.
00:36:06.023 --> 00:36:07.905
had the challenges of going
00:36:07.945 --> 00:36:11.067
to Texas and defending textbooks,
00:36:11.827 --> 00:36:13.969
going to Florida and defending textbooks.
00:36:14.989 --> 00:36:17.451
But it was still a textbook, a school book,
00:36:17.771 --> 00:36:21.432
as opposed to a trade book.
00:36:21.512 --> 00:36:22.592
We've been talking with Ray
00:36:22.653 --> 00:36:23.594
Anthony Shepard,
00:36:23.773 --> 00:36:25.594
author of several really
00:36:25.655 --> 00:36:27.536
extraordinary books for young readers,
00:36:27.615 --> 00:36:29.697
Now or Never, about the Massachusetts
00:36:31.320 --> 00:36:33.722
Runaway, The Daring Escape of Ona Judge,
00:36:33.802 --> 00:36:35.222
and A Long Time Coming,
00:36:35.262 --> 00:36:36.844
A Lyrical Biography of Race
00:36:36.864 --> 00:36:38.224
in America from Ona Judge
00:36:38.244 --> 00:36:39.184
to Barack Obama.
00:36:39.844 --> 00:36:41.146
And your next book coming
00:36:41.266 --> 00:36:43.487
out in twenty twenty six,
00:36:43.547 --> 00:36:44.847
The Forgotten on Patriots
00:36:44.907 --> 00:36:46.588
of Color at Lexington and Concord.
00:36:47.028 --> 00:36:47.728
Is there anything else we
00:36:47.768 --> 00:36:48.548
should talk about, Ray,
00:36:48.568 --> 00:36:50.889
before we let you go?
00:36:50.949 --> 00:36:57.052
No, again, I think it's for me,
00:36:57.132 --> 00:36:58.514
it's about how do you
00:36:58.534 --> 00:37:00.474
produce a story that
00:37:01.226 --> 00:37:04.567
the reader, regardless of ethnic, racial,
00:37:04.686 --> 00:37:06.007
gender background,
00:37:06.527 --> 00:37:09.228
can identify with the protagonist.
00:37:11.969 --> 00:37:13.731
And there are so many
00:37:14.391 --> 00:37:16.612
wonderful stories in American history.
00:37:18.432 --> 00:37:20.373
And I'm just blessed to be
00:37:20.452 --> 00:37:22.514
able to tell a few of them.
00:37:22.534 --> 00:37:23.715
Great.
00:37:23.954 --> 00:37:25.295
Well, thank you for doing it.
00:37:25.315 --> 00:37:27.275
It's a tremendous work you're doing.
00:37:27.295 --> 00:37:28.655
And I really applaud you for it.
00:37:28.695 --> 00:37:30.016
And thank you for joining us today.
00:37:30.807 --> 00:37:31.889
It was my pleasure, Bob,
00:37:31.949 --> 00:37:34.050
and thank you for the opportunity.
00:37:34.070 --> 00:37:35.590
Right.
00:37:35.670 --> 00:37:37.351
So Ray Anthony Shepard,
00:37:37.431 --> 00:37:38.652
author of The Forgotten
00:37:38.733 --> 00:37:39.693
Patriots of Color at
00:37:39.773 --> 00:37:40.873
Lexington and Concord,
00:37:40.914 --> 00:37:42.315
as well as other books.
00:37:42.375 --> 00:37:43.255
And so thank you.
00:37:43.315 --> 00:37:44.596
I want to thank Jonathan Lane,
00:37:44.635 --> 00:37:45.356
our producer,
00:37:45.396 --> 00:37:47.318
who is the man behind the curtain here,
00:37:47.838 --> 00:37:50.340
and our listeners all around the world.
00:37:50.400 --> 00:37:51.420
And every week we thank
00:37:51.460 --> 00:37:52.800
folks in different places.
00:37:52.860 --> 00:37:53.862
And if you're interested,
00:37:54.222 --> 00:37:54.922
if you're in one of these
00:37:54.942 --> 00:37:56.103
places and want some of our
00:37:56.143 --> 00:37:57.623
Revolution Two fifty gear,
00:37:57.664 --> 00:37:59.184
send Jonathan Lane an email.
00:37:59.661 --> 00:38:01.063
jlane at revolution two
00:38:01.123 --> 00:38:02.764
fifty dot org or if you
00:38:02.784 --> 00:38:03.824
have an idea for something
00:38:03.844 --> 00:38:04.605
you'd like to hear about on
00:38:04.625 --> 00:38:06.385
the podcast and this week I
00:38:06.425 --> 00:38:07.646
want to thank our listeners
00:38:07.686 --> 00:38:10.489
in jerusalem and in amman
00:38:10.969 --> 00:38:13.791
and in edinburgh and in
00:38:13.871 --> 00:38:15.411
portland maine and portland
00:38:15.472 --> 00:38:17.092
oregon and harrison new
00:38:17.132 --> 00:38:19.094
jersey spirit lake idaho
00:38:19.153 --> 00:38:20.434
and all places between and
00:38:20.514 --> 00:38:21.655
beyond thanks for joining
00:38:21.695 --> 00:38:23.317
us and now we will be piped
00:38:23.416 --> 00:38:24.617
out on the road to boston