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SYSK Selects: How the Underground Railroad Worked · Stuff You Should Know

0:00
Speaker 1: M Hey everybody, it's me Josh and for this week's
0:03
Speaker 1: s Y s K Selects. Me and Chuck agreed that
0:06
Speaker 1: we should re release our episode on the Underground Railroad.
0:11
Speaker 1: First came out in June of two thousand and eleven
0:13
Speaker 1: and it was a pretty good one. But since we
0:15
Speaker 1: just released our Harriet Tubban episode, we thought this might
0:18
Speaker 1: tie in quite well. So sit back, relax, and enjoy
0:21
Speaker 1: hearing about the thrilling stories from the Underground Railroad and
0:25
Speaker 1: Happy Black History Month. Welcome to Stuff you Should Know
0:35
Speaker 1: from house stuff Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to
0:43
Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark and with me as always
0:46
Speaker 1: as Charles W. Chuck Bryant, which makes this stuff You
0:49
Speaker 1: should know the podcast because Chuck and I are the
0:53
Speaker 1: hosts of that hostesses no host yep, Chuck, Yes, how
0:59
Speaker 1: your How are you? I'm great, man? How are you?
1:02
Speaker 1: I'm fine? It's you and I and Matt are guest
1:05
Speaker 1: producer alone in this entire building. Yeah, this it's uh,
1:10
Speaker 1: the Friday before Memorial Day, Friday afternoon even and it's
1:14
Speaker 1: pretty empty in here, Yes it is. There's lots of
1:18
Speaker 1: echoes that we're gonna have to adjust for and post
1:21
Speaker 1: do we do post anymore? Is this like basically just
1:23
Speaker 1: live to tape. At least we're not getting hateful stairs
1:27
Speaker 1: as we walk through the office. Yeah, it's refreshing, so Chuck.
1:34
Speaker 1: As you know, I grew up in Ohio. I was
1:36
Speaker 1: hoping you had mentioned this. Well, I grew up in Ohio.
1:39
Speaker 1: Your hopes are are fulfilled. Well another reason why, Well, Um,
1:43
Speaker 1: it turns out I recently learned from this article on
1:45
Speaker 1: how the underground Railroad, how the underground railroad worked. We
1:49
Speaker 1: talked about how this is gonna be problematic. Um that
1:53
Speaker 1: an estimated half of all underground railroad workers. Um, we're
1:59
Speaker 1: from Ohio or lived in Ohio or part of Ohio.
2:02
Speaker 1: I had no idea that, but reading that it makes
2:04
Speaker 1: sense because that was such a part of my um
2:07
Speaker 1: upbringing as a child. Everybody's house that was built in
2:11
Speaker 1: like the nineteenth or eighteenth century had like an oh,
2:15
Speaker 1: this is where they kept the freed slaves in the
2:17
Speaker 1: underground roildroad. Everybody's house had like a little spot that
2:20
Speaker 1: supposedly was part of the underground road heritage or some
2:25
Speaker 1: real some were um more believable than others, but normally
2:29
Speaker 1: it was like a public building or like a National
2:32
Speaker 1: Historic Register building that like they gave tours to that
2:35
Speaker 1: was part of the underground railroad. But like everybody's house
2:39
Speaker 1: like had like a little spot in the basement where like, yes,
2:43
Speaker 1: conceivably human beings could stand here and and uh, you know,
2:47
Speaker 1: hide out. But yeah, see I grew up in Georgia.
2:49
Speaker 1: Said that we didn't have those talks. No, And apparently
2:52
Speaker 1: in this article the author points out and I don't
2:56
Speaker 1: know where she got this, but um that there's there's
3:00
Speaker 1: still blemishes on families who were known to have helped
3:04
Speaker 1: slaves on the underground road road in the South still today.
3:07
Speaker 1: I totally I don't know if she's talking about. I
3:09
Speaker 1: thought that was completely out of left field. It was.
3:12
Speaker 1: I grew up in this state and never heard anybody
3:14
Speaker 1: be like, yeah, that guy that lives down the street
3:16
Speaker 1: their family used to hide slaves. Yeah that's not that's
3:21
Speaker 1: not true. So so um, but you you were familiar
3:24
Speaker 1: with the underground road road before this article. I was.
3:27
Speaker 1: But it's a good time to point out that not
3:30
Speaker 1: nearly enough, because black history is so glossed over in
3:35
Speaker 1: American schools except in February. Except in February, and it's
3:39
Speaker 1: still even in February that I went through all my
3:41
Speaker 1: schooling with just knowing like there was an underground railroad
3:45
Speaker 1: and Harriet Tubman ran it. That's it. Period. Yeah, never
3:50
Speaker 1: learned about Malcolm X. I think dread Scott may have
3:53
Speaker 1: been mentioned briefly, but yeah, it's very sad. Yeah, and
3:56
Speaker 1: hopefully that's changed some since then. Well for the list
4:00
Speaker 1: nurse who had similar experiences. Um, we're about a remedy
4:04
Speaker 1: that because we're gonna tell you not only how it worked,
4:07
Speaker 1: we're gonna tell you in so much detail that you
4:08
Speaker 1: could conceivably go start your own right now. That's right,
4:11
Speaker 1: And there are some still around today. Yes. Human trafficking
4:15
Speaker 1: is the new word for um slavery basically um where
4:20
Speaker 1: it usually it's forced into sex work, right, um. And
4:25
Speaker 1: there are groups who are dedicated to like freeing sex
4:28
Speaker 1: workers from forced labor. They're called Polaris, which is renaming
4:34
Speaker 1: of the North Star. Yeah. Um, and then and others.
4:39
Speaker 1: We should do a podcast on human trafficking. I think
4:41
Speaker 1: we have a good article on that that Molly wrote.
4:44
Speaker 1: If I'm not mistaken. Oh really yeah, okay, you're ready, Yeah,
4:48
Speaker 1: let's do it all right, so chuck um, basically the
4:52
Speaker 1: the origins of the UM Underground Railroad, which was the
4:57
Speaker 1: network by which is skate slaves ran along to freedom,
5:02
Speaker 1: almost always to Canada if they were going north. As
5:05
Speaker 1: it turns out, UM probably started before the eighteen twenties. UM,
5:13
Speaker 1: but it couldn't have possibly been called the underground road
5:16
Speaker 1: road until after the eighteen twenties because the actual railroad
5:20
Speaker 1: system wasn't invented until them. Either that or they were
5:22
Speaker 1: like way ahead of their time, right, But it may
5:24
Speaker 1: have had some sort of name, And we know that
5:27
Speaker 1: there were groups of people who were uh formed for
5:30
Speaker 1: the common purpose of aiding escaped slaves to go secure freedom,
5:36
Speaker 1: to get out of the South, or get out of
5:38
Speaker 1: a slave state into protection in a non slave state.
5:42
Speaker 1: Because George Washington complained about it in a letter in
5:46
Speaker 1: seventeen eighty six that he suspected some Quakers that helped
5:49
Speaker 1: some of his slaves escape. He was probably right on
5:52
Speaker 1: the money, tail, yeah, because Quakers were one of the
5:54
Speaker 1: earliest members of the Underground Railroad, and they were the
6:00
Speaker 1: was trusted because they were so recognizable in everybody. Yet
6:04
Speaker 1: Quakers will help you out. Definitely the most trusted white
6:06
Speaker 1: people for sure. UM. We but we should probably point out, um,
6:12
Speaker 1: the reason everybody went to Canada was because there was
6:15
Speaker 1: a federal law in the US. Right, that's right. What
6:18
Speaker 1: was it called. It was called the Fugitive Slave Act
6:22
Speaker 1: of seventeen nine, and uh, it was around since sevente
6:28
Speaker 1: but it really got its teeth in eighteen fifty when
6:30
Speaker 1: it's strengthened the fines and basically made um, helping a
6:35
Speaker 1: slave escape a federal crime, and then uh in non
6:39
Speaker 1: slave states as well, and uh pretty much meant if
6:44
Speaker 1: you were caught as a slave, you were going to
6:46
Speaker 1: be put to death and likely tortured in a public place,
6:50
Speaker 1: and maybe even your slave family or friends that you
6:53
Speaker 1: were with on the plantation were also punished, even though
6:57
Speaker 1: they didn't try to escape. So anyone involved in the
7:00
Speaker 1: and even not being involved but being involved by relationship
7:03
Speaker 1: or something like that, UM, really had a lot to
7:06
Speaker 1: lose from this one person making it to freedom, which really,
7:10
Speaker 1: um is it's just very heartening when you look back
7:14
Speaker 1: on what these people did. They risked a lot. Um
7:17
Speaker 1: in the eighteen fifties stiffening of the Slave Act. Right, Um,
7:24
Speaker 1: if you armed a slave, which was routinely done because
7:27
Speaker 1: this is dangerous. Um. Then you were subject to execution
7:33
Speaker 1: no matter who you were, white, black, whatever um that was,
7:36
Speaker 1: that was punishable by being executed. So people who were
7:39
Speaker 1: helping escape slaves were putting a lot on the line, right, Yeah,
7:43
Speaker 1: And and one of the miss there's a few miss
7:45
Speaker 1: that even this article kind of uh perpetuates a bit.
7:48
Speaker 1: But um rarely or not rarely, but more often than not,
7:53
Speaker 1: they were other black people or former slaves or current
7:56
Speaker 1: slaves helping the other slaves on the underground round road.
8:00
Speaker 1: It was not a big happy group of white northern
8:03
Speaker 1: abolitionists risking their life to help out the slaves. They
8:06
Speaker 1: did that some, but it was usually quakers um or
8:10
Speaker 1: you know, like I said before, slaves or former slaves. Okay,
8:14
Speaker 1: so that's one myth. There's a few others. Well, let's
8:18
Speaker 1: go through this. What what did an escape look like
8:21
Speaker 1: right along the underground railroad during its height in the
8:24
Speaker 1: mid nineteenth century, h what would happen was free black
8:29
Speaker 1: people would send a field agent, what they called the
8:31
Speaker 1: field agent. Um. It was a lot of times a
8:34
Speaker 1: minister or a doctor posing as like a census taker
8:37
Speaker 1: to anybody who could move throughout a community undetected so
8:41
Speaker 1: they would make contact with a current slave who supposedly
8:45
Speaker 1: wanted to escape, and they had to gain their trust,
8:47
Speaker 1: because this whole thing was about trust. You really had
8:51
Speaker 1: to trust because people would sell out their own own
8:54
Speaker 1: kind to gain favor with with the master sometimes, so
8:58
Speaker 1: sometimes you couldn't even trust your fellow slave, So you
9:01
Speaker 1: really had to gain their trust as the field agent,
9:03
Speaker 1: and then they would eventually, once that trust was gained,
9:06
Speaker 1: arranged for the escape from the plantation to travel to
9:11
Speaker 1: the first safe house to a conductor. Actually, I'm sorry,
9:16
Speaker 1: they passed along to the conductor who would take you
9:18
Speaker 1: to your first station. Yes, and that was the beginning
9:22
Speaker 1: of the journey, right, And the station was basically somebody's
9:25
Speaker 1: house usually UM, and the head of the household as
9:29
Speaker 1: a station master, and that was somebody who was putting
9:33
Speaker 1: his life in the life of his family's on the line.
9:37
Speaker 1: Feed and house and hide this person for a little while,
9:41
Speaker 1: UM possibly set him up with the disguise, which um
9:44
Speaker 1: they got fairly um. Yes, yeah, there's there's a story
9:51
Speaker 1: of one in a um apparently with a seminal work
9:54
Speaker 1: on the Underground Railroad, appropriately titled The Underground Railroad, written
9:58
Speaker 1: by Wilburt Sea Bird, right, and he talks about how, um,
10:03
Speaker 1: a black woman was basically made up to look like
10:07
Speaker 1: a wealthy white woman and to complete this disguise, was
10:10
Speaker 1: given a white baby, um too for her journey. Yeah,
10:16
Speaker 1: so people were, you know, fanatic about this. I read
10:19
Speaker 1: another one, UM, a couple from Savannah. UM. The woman
10:24
Speaker 1: was the daughter of the slave, her slave owner, and
10:29
Speaker 1: her mother was a slave, a house servant ever, um,
10:33
Speaker 1: so she was light skinned, so they had her pose
10:36
Speaker 1: as a frail, aging white man and her husband posed
10:41
Speaker 1: as like a you know, a loyal servant slave UM
10:45
Speaker 1: on their journey all the way from Savannah up to
10:47
Speaker 1: I think Philadelphia or Boston. Um. But yeah, that was
10:51
Speaker 1: kind of harrowing. Apparently they were almost found out a
10:54
Speaker 1: bunch of times. Yeah. So I can imagine, like just
10:58
Speaker 1: trying to escape through the woods scary enough. Trying to
11:01
Speaker 1: escape disguised in plain sight has to just be nerve racking. Yeah,
11:06
Speaker 1: you know, especially the lady with a white baby, because
11:08
Speaker 1: I imagine that whoever might have found her out would
11:10
Speaker 1: not have been too happy about that at the time.
11:13
Speaker 1: At least along the way if you did maybe encounter
11:16
Speaker 1: a train conductor who found you out, but was willing
11:19
Speaker 1: to keep his mouth shut for money. You needed money.
11:22
Speaker 1: Most slaves didn't have money because they were not paid. Um.
11:26
Speaker 1: And the this was I guess at the station. The
11:31
Speaker 1: station master might also hook you up with some money
11:33
Speaker 1: that came from what are called stockholders. Um. And stockholders
11:37
Speaker 1: were probably wealthy abolitionists who didn't really want to get
11:39
Speaker 1: their hands dirty. But we're happy to support the cause financially. True, right, yeah,
11:46
Speaker 1: And I didn't get I mean, were they just people
11:47
Speaker 1: who supported the cause basically financially, Yeah, but you know,
11:51
Speaker 1: obviously in their in their hearts as well. Uh, now
11:55
Speaker 1: I know what you mean. Though they didn't risk, you know,
11:58
Speaker 1: walking people through the woods. No. Abolitionists, despite you know,
12:01
Speaker 1: they're there desire to end slavery, were frequently accused, and
12:07
Speaker 1: rightfully so in a lot of cases of you know, saying,
12:10
Speaker 1: what we we think, slavery is vomitable, but you're freed,
12:14
Speaker 1: and that's great, but go live over there. We still
12:17
Speaker 1: want to just have our very lily white parties and
12:19
Speaker 1: lives and all that. Um. And there were a lot
12:23
Speaker 1: of abolitions like that. So I would imagine that just
12:26
Speaker 1: giving money two people to use for bribes or for
12:30
Speaker 1: travel or you know, to support these station houses. Probably
12:34
Speaker 1: really you know, hit home. It's the same thing today,
12:37
Speaker 1: like people don't go help like say the homeless, you're
12:39
Speaker 1: resolving your guilt, they give money to, you know, organizations
12:43
Speaker 1: that actually deal with the homeless. I think that this
12:45
Speaker 1: was very similar to that. I think you're probably right. Uh, runaways,
12:49
Speaker 1: um usually didn't travel alone, although again I read somewhere
12:54
Speaker 1: else on on one of the websites that a lot
12:56
Speaker 1: of times they were alone. Um. But when they weren't,
12:58
Speaker 1: they would have a conductor guide them to the next station,
13:01
Speaker 1: usually about a day away. They didn't want to make
13:04
Speaker 1: it like, you know, a three day journey because it
13:06
Speaker 1: just you know, you you probably don't have tons of
13:08
Speaker 1: food and water, and it's just more dangerous the further
13:10
Speaker 1: you're going, right, not between station houses. The journey itself
13:13
Speaker 1: to freedom yet last days, weeks, months. Yeah, each each
13:17
Speaker 1: station was about a day away ideally, right, they would
13:20
Speaker 1: follow the north star. Yeah, that's good. That's why that one,
13:23
Speaker 1: um modern hilarious. Yeah, that's why it's called that full circle. Yeah.
13:29
Speaker 1: When the clouds were out, Um, there's the old trick
13:32
Speaker 1: of looking where the moss grows because on tree trunks,
13:36
Speaker 1: moss usually grows on the north side, and you wanted
13:38
Speaker 1: to be headed north. There were instances where because they
13:42
Speaker 1: made it a very zig zagging route usually you know,
13:44
Speaker 1: they didn't want to make it a straight line, so
13:46
Speaker 1: it made it easier to track, but it also made
13:48
Speaker 1: it easier to get lost as a slave. It did.
13:52
Speaker 1: And actually there's a sidebar towards the end of this
13:55
Speaker 1: talking about quilt patterns, right, and there are codes embedded
13:59
Speaker 1: with the I I found a substantial amount of it.
14:04
Speaker 1: I see, I found stuff saying that was like mythical
14:07
Speaker 1: that in the songs. Check out um os black history
14:11
Speaker 1: dot com. They have this list, this key of like
14:14
Speaker 1: what all of these different quilt patterns are and what
14:17
Speaker 1: they meant. Um two slaves who came upon a quilt
14:21
Speaker 1: and one of them was this um kind of zigzagged X.
14:24
Speaker 1: It's called the um the drunken Path, And basically it's
14:28
Speaker 1: saying like going a zigzag pattern because there's guys out,
14:32
Speaker 1: there's slave hunters around, and if you say turned started
14:36
Speaker 1: walking south, they would be less likely to suspect that
14:39
Speaker 1: you were an escape slave if you looked like you
14:41
Speaker 1: were purposefully walking south, because what slave of walks south?
14:45
Speaker 1: That's where the south is right right that point. But
14:48
Speaker 1: I mean, if it is made up, this guy did
14:49
Speaker 1: a good job of perpetuating it because it's very interesting. Well,
14:53
Speaker 1: even in here it says it's it's one of the
14:55
Speaker 1: well known legends or not. They just don't know because
14:58
Speaker 1: a lot of this stuff and this could the bring
15:00
Speaker 1: that up. A lot we don't know about because the
15:02
Speaker 1: underground railroad was secret, so we don't know about a
15:05
Speaker 1: lot of the places. We don't know a lot of
15:07
Speaker 1: the routes or the people who worked there or who
15:10
Speaker 1: actually started it. Oh and Josh also I mentioned the
15:13
Speaker 1: moss on the trees. Clear nights were better to see
15:16
Speaker 1: the stars, but traveling in the rain was pretty good too,
15:18
Speaker 1: because fat white plantation owner probably wanted to be inside
15:22
Speaker 1: by the fire when it was raining and not chasing
15:25
Speaker 1: after his slaves. So let's talk about UM the laws.
15:58
Speaker 1: We we mentioned it kind of specifically UM earlier about
16:03
Speaker 1: some of the I guess the punishment that that could
16:05
Speaker 1: befall anyone helping somebody right, Um. And in the Fugitive
16:13
Speaker 1: Slave Act, UM basically created the first laws that said
16:18
Speaker 1: this an escape slave can be gone and gotten legally right.
16:22
Speaker 1: But there were slave states and there were non slave states,
16:26
Speaker 1: and the non slave states said, well, yeah, that's a
16:29
Speaker 1: great law, and you do whatever you want down in
16:31
Speaker 1: the South, but we're not really going to enforce it,
16:33
Speaker 1: and when we do, it's going to be very light. Well,
16:37
Speaker 1: in eighteen fifty, this thing got a lot of teeth, um,
16:41
Speaker 1: like you were saying in the fines were were stepped up,
16:44
Speaker 1: the penalties were harsher execution, um was it was a
16:48
Speaker 1: lot more um doable, I guess. And then um, it
16:54
Speaker 1: also became legal for slave hunters to walk into a
16:57
Speaker 1: free state, a non slave state and be like, Hey,
17:00
Speaker 1: that black guy right there, I think he's an escaped slave.
17:03
Speaker 1: He should come with me to anybody he could legally
17:06
Speaker 1: claim it without having to justify even if they were
17:08
Speaker 1: free men. Yes, um. And apparently there were rumors of
17:11
Speaker 1: like slave traders like luring um, young black kids in
17:17
Speaker 1: free states onto boats and then like taking them off
17:20
Speaker 1: to the deep South. It's like, what are you gonna do?
17:22
Speaker 1: How are you going to find these people? There's no
17:24
Speaker 1: documentation like this. Um. So basically the North came to
17:28
Speaker 1: really resent this change in the law in eighteen fifty
17:33
Speaker 1: because people who were complacent living in non slave states,
17:36
Speaker 1: suddenly we're kind of having slavery imposed upon them a
17:39
Speaker 1: little more. And then the dread Scott case, like you
17:43
Speaker 1: mentioned earlier, that really sealed the deal and really got abolitionists. UM.
17:48
Speaker 1: I guess their their roles expanded tremendously after that. And
17:52
Speaker 1: then as a result also the underground railroad became much
17:55
Speaker 1: more organized. Yeah, that is dread Scott v. Sandford, and UH.
18:01
Speaker 1: It was famous because dread Scott, a slave, sued for
18:04
Speaker 1: his freedom for himself and his wife and his two
18:07
Speaker 1: daughters and uh on the grounds that they lived quite
18:12
Speaker 1: a bit of their lives in places like Wisconsin and Minnesota,
18:16
Speaker 1: in these outlying Northwest territories that or northern territories that
18:20
Speaker 1: had where it was illegal slavery was actually illegal. So
18:23
Speaker 1: he sued on those grounds, and in one of probably
18:26
Speaker 1: the worst Supreme Court decisions in the history of this country,
18:29
Speaker 1: they decided because the panel was full of Southerners. The
18:34
Speaker 1: panel Supreme Court justices were a lot of Southerners, and
18:38
Speaker 1: they ruled that black people were not or people of
18:41
Speaker 1: African descent were not citizens of the United States, free
18:45
Speaker 1: or not they are not citizens. Therefore they cannot sue
18:48
Speaker 1: for their freedom right. They don't have any rights, so
18:52
Speaker 1: they can be basically captured and taken to Yes, the
18:55
Speaker 1: a life of slavery again. But if it hadn't been
18:58
Speaker 1: for the dread Scott case, Uh, we may never have.
19:01
Speaker 1: Well we may have, but it really sped up the
19:03
Speaker 1: process of the Thirteenth Amendment in the Emancipation Proclamation and
19:06
Speaker 1: hence the Civil War and hence the Civil War. And
19:09
Speaker 1: some of his descendants still live in St. Louis today. Well,
19:13
Speaker 1: shout out to the Scots of St. Louis. UM and
19:17
Speaker 1: Chuck we said that this this um precipitated the Civil War.
19:21
Speaker 1: The underground railroad helped move it along. The dread Scott case.
19:24
Speaker 1: It's it's basically these things, UM, Northerners actively subverting federal law. UM.
19:32
Speaker 1: And the South economic cloud really ticked the South off
19:37
Speaker 1: the the South imposing its views on slavery on the
19:41
Speaker 1: North through this eighteen fifty strengthening and the dread Scot case. UM,
19:46
Speaker 1: it really ticked off the North. So this division was
19:50
Speaker 1: was UM, it's very much part of what led up
19:53
Speaker 1: to the Civil War. Yeah, Pennsylvania even thought about ah
19:59
Speaker 1: nullified ring the Fugitive Slave Act. They didn't like it
20:01
Speaker 1: so much, but then they decided, you know, a better
20:03
Speaker 1: way to do this is probably to be subversive and
20:06
Speaker 1: to support things like the underground railroad on the down low,
20:09
Speaker 1: rather than cause some big political snake write a check.
20:13
Speaker 1: Exactly right. Um, So we say that because the Civil Wars.
20:20
Speaker 1: Whenever you ask a kid, you know what why the
20:22
Speaker 1: Civil War happened? Slavery. I mean, that's a that's a
20:26
Speaker 1: big part of it. But that's why it's not just slavery.
20:28
Speaker 1: It wasn't like the North was like, slavery is wrong
20:31
Speaker 1: and we're gonna go to war with you over it,
20:33
Speaker 1: or the South was like, we love slavery, We're not
20:36
Speaker 1: part of you any longer, although the latter I've heard
20:39
Speaker 1: recently was um much closer to the point that the
20:43
Speaker 1: South was perfectly happy with succeeding creating its own country
20:46
Speaker 1: and basically creating an economic empire based on free labor,
20:50
Speaker 1: that that took over the entire Caribbean, and that the
20:53
Speaker 1: Southern US. Yeah, I wish I was more of a
20:56
Speaker 1: civil war. Buff. I'm glad you're not shuck. Really, they're
21:00
Speaker 1: in I wouldn't say obnoxious, but man, do they know
21:03
Speaker 1: a lot about the Civil War and they like correcting
21:06
Speaker 1: people too. Yeah, and we're going to hear from them.
21:09
Speaker 1: So chuck, Um, when you did finally make it out
21:12
Speaker 1: along this this route, um up to the northern the
21:15
Speaker 1: extreme Northern States, the northern part of the extreme Northern States,
21:20
Speaker 1: and to Canada. Um, it could take days, weeks, months,
21:25
Speaker 1: It could take twenty four hours if you happen to
21:27
Speaker 1: have the money and the gaul to ride a train,
21:31
Speaker 1: or if you live in a border state. Yeah, which
21:33
Speaker 1: apparently is why a lot of slaves never escaped from
21:36
Speaker 1: the Deep South. It was longer ago and they didn't.
21:40
Speaker 1: They wouldn't have taken the underground railroad, which went exclusively north.
21:44
Speaker 1: I believe they would have gone to Florida or to Mexico.
21:47
Speaker 1: Never knew that. So Mexico in eighty nine outlawed slavery
21:50
Speaker 1: and became active in protecting slaves who escaped to Mexico. Yeah.
21:56
Speaker 1: Native American Indians go figure, we're very empathetic. They were
22:00
Speaker 1: probably like join the club, my man, come on in
22:04
Speaker 1: almost literally chuck so in Florida in Spain said we're
22:10
Speaker 1: issuing a decree here that says, any any slave or
22:14
Speaker 1: native American who leaves an English colony and makes it
22:18
Speaker 1: to Florida is a free florid Ian, a free a
22:22
Speaker 1: free member of the Spanish crown. Right. All we want
22:25
Speaker 1: from you is that you convert to a Catholic convert
22:28
Speaker 1: to Catholicism and become a member of the military for
22:31
Speaker 1: a prescribed amount of time, right, um. And in return
22:35
Speaker 1: you're a citizen here. Right. So that's why Florida attracted
22:38
Speaker 1: a bunch of people, and the reason they did it
22:40
Speaker 1: was specifically to attract people from um England, the English
22:44
Speaker 1: territories like Georgia or South Carolina, because they wanted to
22:47
Speaker 1: jump start the economic engine, but they weren't going to
22:50
Speaker 1: do it on slavery. Right. I wonder what impact that
22:53
Speaker 1: has today. I wonder if there are more African American
22:56
Speaker 1: Catholics in Florida proportionately because of that. Well, one of
22:59
Speaker 1: the impacts that it had that's still around the day
23:02
Speaker 1: are the Seminoles. The Seminoles were a recent tribe that
23:05
Speaker 1: started in about the eighteenth century UM based on displaced
23:09
Speaker 1: Creek Indians who made it to Florida to take Spain
23:11
Speaker 1: up on their offer and escape slaves. And now there's
23:16
Speaker 1: a division in the Seminole tribe between Black Seminoles and
23:18
Speaker 1: Red Seminals, and it's not they don't always get along.
23:21
Speaker 1: But during this time, the Seminole Indians came up because
23:27
Speaker 1: in a lot of cases, black slave, freed slaves or
23:29
Speaker 1: escaped slaves would come up to an Indian Indian sentiment,
23:32
Speaker 1: lived near it, or be absorbed into it. And that's
23:35
Speaker 1: where the Seminoles came from. That's pretty cool, didn't it.
23:38
Speaker 1: There's really one jerk in this whole thing, and that's
23:40
Speaker 1: that's yeah. Our ancestors chucked. They were white Northerners too.
23:46
Speaker 1: It's not all in the South, white jerk, white Northerners probably,
23:52
Speaker 1: h Yeah. Anyway, I'm just always stick up for the South. Well,
23:55
Speaker 1: think about it that there were an estimated two thousand
23:57
Speaker 1: to three thousand underground railroad workers. Yeah, there there are
24:03
Speaker 1: a lot more people in the US and the North
24:05
Speaker 1: and the South than that at the time. Buddy. Yeah,
24:07
Speaker 1: that's a good point. Uh. It is interesting though to
24:10
Speaker 1: me that you said Canada, because that was where many
24:12
Speaker 1: of them ended up. And I never knew that. I
24:14
Speaker 1: never knew that, and it made sense, because why go
24:18
Speaker 1: to Pennsylvania even though they're sympathetic to a certain degree
24:22
Speaker 1: when the Fugitive Slave Act still is hanging over my
24:25
Speaker 1: head and somebody could turn me in for some dough
24:27
Speaker 1: if they wanted to. Yeah, let's just go to Canada
24:30
Speaker 1: where they don't care and they don't have those laws. Plus,
24:33
Speaker 1: I mean, it's not like you're gonna just stop in Detroit.
24:36
Speaker 1: You're gonna be like, oh no, I'm gonna keep moving
24:38
Speaker 1: to Canada. Eat. So we were saying that there there
24:43
Speaker 1: was some involvement by some people. There was UM separate involvement,
24:47
Speaker 1: disconnected involvement, whatever. But some of the people, some of
24:50
Speaker 1: these abolitionists UM and freed slaves, UM and escaped slaves
24:55
Speaker 1: who have made lives for themselves UM formed in these
24:58
Speaker 1: northern non slave states enclaves of where where an escape
25:03
Speaker 1: slave could feel very free, like Boston, Philadelphia, UM, I
25:06
Speaker 1: think New York. Um. They formed these things called vigilance committees. Right. Yeah,
25:10
Speaker 1: it's very nice. They provided like some protection for them, uh,
25:16
Speaker 1: tried to get them work, try to give them a
25:17
Speaker 1: place to live, and so you know, it's just sort
25:20
Speaker 1: of like hey, now you're you're safe now and we're
25:23
Speaker 1: gonna help you set up life as an American, Yeah,
25:27
Speaker 1: and get something that everyone in this country should be
25:31
Speaker 1: born with, which is freedom right. And here's a credit
25:34
Speaker 1: card to enslave you in a different way. That came later,
25:40
Speaker 1: and that touched all races, it did, so, Chuck. There's
25:43
Speaker 1: um one one person who kind of rose above all
25:47
Speaker 1: others as far as the underground Railroad went. And her
25:50
Speaker 1: name was Harriet Tubman. She was, she wasn't It is
25:53
Speaker 1: still referred to as the Moses of her people. Yeah.
25:56
Speaker 1: It is not a cliche to to bring up Harriet
25:58
Speaker 1: Tubman as you know, like of where she's gonna bring
26:00
Speaker 1: it very duban. Course we are, because she was the
26:03
Speaker 1: Moses of her people. Yea. And she was an escape
26:05
Speaker 1: slave from Maryland and very sadly I went back to
26:08
Speaker 1: get her family and helped them escape. Found her husband
26:11
Speaker 1: had a new wife and he was like, yeah, umu
26:15
Speaker 1: to stay here. Yeah, and she wasn't too happy with that, clearly.
26:20
Speaker 1: So she reportedly books say um kind of hardened her
26:24
Speaker 1: a little bit, which in the end helped her because
26:28
Speaker 1: you sort of needed a bit of a hard heart
26:31
Speaker 1: to lead people in the Underground Railroad. You didn't need
26:34
Speaker 1: whiners and criers and people that would draw attention and
26:37
Speaker 1: make noise. Yeah. Apparently she would threaten to kill people
26:40
Speaker 1: if they didn't shut up. Yeah, like, quiet down, I'm
26:42
Speaker 1: trying to get you to freedom. Just shut up about
26:45
Speaker 1: it was her was her motto officially, I think. And
26:48
Speaker 1: she was individually probably the most successful uh conductor on
26:52
Speaker 1: the underground railroad. Right, Yeah, I think uh at least
26:56
Speaker 1: seventy slaves um that she led to freedom to New
26:59
Speaker 1: York and camp personally thirteen journeys and these are long trips.
27:03
Speaker 1: Well think about it. Also, she's an escape slave. She
27:06
Speaker 1: goes back into slave states thirteen times to guide people
27:11
Speaker 1: out bad. She's a big bad mama. She Uh. She
27:16
Speaker 1: went on to serve as a spy, as a scout,
27:18
Speaker 1: and a nurse for the Union Army and received no
27:21
Speaker 1: military wartime pension for that, even though she was Harriet
27:24
Speaker 1: Tubman and Um went on to sell fruits and vegetables
27:28
Speaker 1: store to door. You're joking, and wrote a book and
27:31
Speaker 1: lived off profits from her book. She actually made money
27:33
Speaker 1: off of it, which is good the US as a
27:39
Speaker 1: long Yeah, so, Chuck, you want to talk about how
28:01
Speaker 1: many people were let out we we we mentioned Harriet
28:04
Speaker 1: Tubman lad at least seventy personally UM and estimates very
28:08
Speaker 1: wildly as to how many people escaped UM. As we said,
28:13
Speaker 1: the heyday of the underground railroad was eighteen twenties to
28:16
Speaker 1: the eighteen sixties. Say UM. Some some people maintain about
28:21
Speaker 1: a hundred thousand people escaped, which is that's huge. UM.
28:26
Speaker 1: On the other end, UH, the Journal Black Studies estimates
28:29
Speaker 1: of between eighteen thirty and sixty UM only about two
28:32
Speaker 1: thousand people escaped via underground railroad. The National Park Service
28:37
Speaker 1: settled somewhere in the middle and says, yeah, let's say
28:40
Speaker 1: a thousand per year. But again it's very secretive. People
28:45
Speaker 1: have no idea who was who, whether a house really
28:48
Speaker 1: was a stop. There are some places that are most
28:51
Speaker 1: decidedly UM parts of the underground road road that are
28:55
Speaker 1: still around to day, like the Dobbin Horse Tavern and Gettysburg,
28:58
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania has movable case that people used to hide in.
29:02
Speaker 1: It was a house at the time. UM. But because
29:05
Speaker 1: of the secrecy, because of the success of it of it, UM,
29:08
Speaker 1: we we have no idea you know, who was a
29:10
Speaker 1: part of it, who wasn't. And that's pretty neat, I think,
29:14
Speaker 1: But there's the National Park Services really spent a lot
29:17
Speaker 1: of time and effort and money so far um figuring out,
29:22
Speaker 1: you know, where the underground railroad ran and who is
29:25
Speaker 1: a part of it, and what buildings were in to
29:26
Speaker 1: preserve the buildings, and there's a there's actually a bike
29:29
Speaker 1: um trail that you can run I think or something
29:33
Speaker 1: like that along established identified underground railroad routes. Yeah, pretty cool,
29:40
Speaker 1: you know you. I just wanted to point out when
29:42
Speaker 1: you said the our checkered history, America's checkered history. I
29:46
Speaker 1: still feel England's stank on this. Oh yeah, that was
29:50
Speaker 1: early enough to wear. It wasn't like you know, rednecks
29:52
Speaker 1: from the south this. These are still like English fops
29:55
Speaker 1: doing this stuff. So I blame England, You blame England.
30:00
Speaker 1: I'm trying to figure out when my my line is
30:02
Speaker 1: drawn and when I'm saying this was America because even
30:05
Speaker 1: after the Revolutionary where it was still just people from
30:07
Speaker 1: England living here. Okay, So England is your fault. Take
30:13
Speaker 1: that in England and it's Canada the big hero to
30:16
Speaker 1: you and this. Yeah, of course, man, you know that's
30:19
Speaker 1: still a territory of the English crown really yeah to
30:23
Speaker 1: you on that one, pal, I don't know what to think. Um,
30:26
Speaker 1: so wait we before we go, we have to mention
30:28
Speaker 1: John Brown. We talked about how like a lot of
30:30
Speaker 1: people were like, here's some money, I'll be a stockholder
30:33
Speaker 1: in the underground road road and impress my friends. John
30:36
Speaker 1: Brown walked the walk he lived in like freed black colonies.
30:41
Speaker 1: He um, if he didn't do it himself, he oversaw
30:44
Speaker 1: the murder of five unarmed pro slavery um settlers in Kansas,
30:49
Speaker 1: which is up for grabs between slavery and in a
30:52
Speaker 1: non slavery state. Um. And he basically turned into a
30:55
Speaker 1: guerrilla and staged raids on pro slavery settlements and killed
30:59
Speaker 1: lots of people. Um. And then he staged the raid
31:02
Speaker 1: on Harper's ferry. Yeah yeah uh and was eventually caught
31:05
Speaker 1: and hanged for it. But he was as far as
31:08
Speaker 1: the abolitionists go, he was like, um that he he was,
31:12
Speaker 1: I guess you could say equal to Harriet Tubman as
31:15
Speaker 1: far as in the abolitionist camp where she was in
31:18
Speaker 1: the freed slaves camp, he was hands on and did it.
31:21
Speaker 1: Did you hear the box car guy who who packed
31:24
Speaker 1: himself up in a box and had himself ship to Philadelphia. No,
31:27
Speaker 1: did it work? Yeah, awesome. He had like some biscuits
31:30
Speaker 1: and a little bit of water and some air holes
31:33
Speaker 1: and his I think his nickname is box Car. I
31:35
Speaker 1: can't remember his full name. But they, you know, opened
31:38
Speaker 1: up the crate in Philadelphia and he climbed out and
31:39
Speaker 1: they were like, congratulations, you're holy cant. So the bravery
31:45
Speaker 1: I mean, not just the slaves themselves, people who helped,
31:48
Speaker 1: I mean the bravery of these people at the time
31:49
Speaker 1: cannot be understated, agreed, because you were getting tortured and
31:54
Speaker 1: killed if you were caught, and all for your freedom.
31:57
Speaker 1: That's all you were looking for. Pretty heavy stuff. Yes, so, Chuck,
32:02
Speaker 1: if they want to learn more about the underground railroad,
32:06
Speaker 1: they should type in underground railroad in the search bar,
32:09
Speaker 1: how stuff works dot com right, um, and then of
32:12
Speaker 1: course brings up listener mail. And you know, I bet
32:16
Speaker 1: the ladies from stuff you miss in history class have
32:19
Speaker 1: probably done one on this already. And so I would
32:22
Speaker 1: seek that out for another angle, because sometimes we double up,
32:26
Speaker 1: and it's always good to hear different angles on these things. Yeah,
32:29
Speaker 1: and they're a great choke too, and you can compare
32:31
Speaker 1: it word for word. Eventually, by comparing the transcripts on
32:34
Speaker 1: the blogs, right, they're like they were a lot more
32:36
Speaker 1: factual than Chuck and Josh. All right, Josh, I'm gonna
32:39
Speaker 1: call this critical email from Katie. We don't read a
32:42
Speaker 1: lot of criticisms much, but this was very specific, so
32:46
Speaker 1: I thought we would. Hi, Chuck and Josh. I'm a
32:48
Speaker 1: new listener, but it recently listened to about sixty of
32:51
Speaker 1: your shows. I am thirty one years old and work
32:53
Speaker 1: as a film producer. You guys have really grown on
32:57
Speaker 1: me slowly. The concept of the show is the best part.
33:00
Speaker 1: I think there are a few things that keeping or
33:02
Speaker 1: keeping you guys from really going big and would like
33:04
Speaker 1: to share my thoughts. First, I think the podcast are
33:07
Speaker 1: a bit slow and have a few too many personal
33:09
Speaker 1: jokes every time Chuck has a personal story to go
33:12
Speaker 1: along with the topic. This is the least entertaining and interesting.
33:15
Speaker 1: Your personal relationships to the topic are mundane. Sorry, this
33:18
Speaker 1: should be cut. The banter is good. You are clearly
33:21
Speaker 1: smart and witty, and that is enough to keep the
33:23
Speaker 1: listener engaged. Josh, your intros are so boring. Why not
33:27
Speaker 1: mix it up and or cut the small Talk. I
33:30
Speaker 1: fast forward past it every time, and I think your
33:33
Speaker 1: listener mail is the worst part of the podcast. I
33:35
Speaker 1: think you lose at least half, if not more, of
33:37
Speaker 1: your listeners at this part. Save that stuff for the blog.
33:41
Speaker 1: The podcasts themselves need to be solid and tight. The
33:43
Speaker 1: production value fails in comparison to This American Life or
33:46
Speaker 1: Planet Money. For these reasons, I would highly suggest getting
33:50
Speaker 1: a new producer. Taking pot shots at Jerry, it's just
33:54
Speaker 1: so wrong. You need to make over big time. You
33:57
Speaker 1: need new music in your intros and throughout the shopper apps,
34:00
Speaker 1: sound effects and more. Out of studio commentary. Some of
34:03
Speaker 1: my favorite podcast our Saunas, Hangovers, Cremation, Sherpa's Reincarnation, Mummies,
34:09
Speaker 1: and Altitude basically go be Radio Lab. I listened to
34:13
Speaker 1: your Guatemala pieces while I was traveling Guatemala last week.
34:17
Speaker 1: Pretty cool in hopes of supplementing my education about the
34:20
Speaker 1: country while traveling there. But you failed miserably. Actually, she
34:24
Speaker 1: says it failed miserable. I get the point, though. Uh.
34:28
Speaker 1: They were my least favorite podcast you guys have done,
34:30
Speaker 1: and I think you genuinely wasted your listeners time with
34:34
Speaker 1: your personal, pointless stories about your free vacation. I was
34:37
Speaker 1: shocked to learn how small your perspective of the world is,
34:40
Speaker 1: considering how often you both write and research about the world.
34:43
Speaker 1: Your impressions of Guatemala sounded like you've never left the South. Uh.
34:47
Speaker 1: They were naive and not worthy of two hours of
34:49
Speaker 1: my time. On the other hand, it was fantastic to
34:53
Speaker 1: listen how volcanoes work while climbing volcanoes in Antigua. This
34:57
Speaker 1: is what you guys are best at and you need
34:59
Speaker 1: to stick to this, but it needs to be better. Seriously,
35:03
Speaker 1: you have mastered the podcast medium, but there is so
35:05
Speaker 1: much potential yet to be tapped. And she says taped,
35:09
Speaker 1: I guess she means tapped. I hope you guys continue
35:12
Speaker 1: to make great podcast and that you really up the
35:14
Speaker 1: production value. Thank you, Katie M. P s. I happen
35:18
Speaker 1: to own a house in Turkey and I've spent much
35:20
Speaker 1: time in Turkish bats. You define them incorrectly in your
35:23
Speaker 1: Sono podcast. Who's that Katie? Yes, Katie M. Thank you
35:28
Speaker 1: Katie with the tips. We appreciate the insight and thanks
35:33
Speaker 1: for listening. You don't know why, but thank you for listening.
35:37
Speaker 1: Right well, we've mastered the medium. Okay, except for like
35:40
Speaker 1: the fifty points. Well, if you have any pointers for
35:44
Speaker 1: us or tips, we want to hear them. We're always
35:46
Speaker 1: open to that kind of thing, So shoot us an
35:49
Speaker 1: email at Stuff Podcast at how stuff works dot com,
35:59
Speaker 1: be short at check out our new video podcast, Stuff
36:01
Speaker 1: from the Future. Join how Stuff Work staff as we
36:04
Speaker 1: explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow.