Latest / Who Did What Now With Katie Charlwood / 150. John Brown - Part I: American Abolitionist

Transcript

150. John Brown - Part I: American Abolitionist · Who Did What Now With Katie Charlwood

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hello, delicious friends, and welcome to a very special bonus
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: fourth of July episode of Who Did What Now? The
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: history podcast That's Not Your History Class with me your
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: host Katie Charlewood, history harlot and reader of books. It
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: is that time of year again where the United States
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: of America celebrates its independence from the British Empire, something
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: that many other countries have done, and it has an
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: official day of celebration like many other countries have done,
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: because the British Empire it had quite a big reach. Empires,
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: as a general rule, tend to unit, they tend to
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: spread out. And so every year the United States of
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: America celebrate this with like fireworks and hot dogs, if
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: the movies have anything to tell me, and everyone wears red,
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: white and blue, which coincidentally is also the colors of
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: the British flag and the French. But I'm just saying
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: that there's only so many colors. There's only so many colors,
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: and you know, die wasn't cheap back in the day.
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: I'm just saying Anyway, I thought, what better way to celebrate,
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: you know, the fourth of July with my amazing American friends,
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: followers and fools. Then to talk about the first man
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: to be executed for treason in the United States. What
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: can I say? It just seemed like a very very
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: interesting piece of American history. And like I had no
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: idea who John Brown was, Like I mean, I had
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: a very vague notion, Like I had a consideration of
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: who John Browne was. I was like, Oh, he's that
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: guy executed for treason, right. That was it. That was
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: my entire wealth of knowledge on John Brown. And I
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: was informed about him when I was in La Los Angeles.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: And I don't know if it was, like I know,
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: I was in a car, and I don't know if
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: it was when I was being picked up from the
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: airport or when I was traveling to my show, my
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: live show. It was one of those two times. I'm
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: fairly certain. I'm fairly certain. Yeah and so and so.
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: The moment I heard about this, I was like, this
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: is amazing. I need to have this is my fourth
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: of July special. I was like this isn't it. My
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: teeth were sinking into it. I was like, I need
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: and so I have been listening to podcasts and reading
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: journals and old timey newspapers because I've got my subscriptions
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: and documents and books and yeah, yeah, the wonderful thing
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: about being a member of my local library is like
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: I got access to stuff. But yeah, I've spent a
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: lot of time researching this just to make sure that
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: everything I was saying was correct, because this man, I'm
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: so impressed, and I'm really impressed by men. You'll know this,
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: but AnyWho, I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, Katie,
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: quite your jibbil jabba in fact me, in fact you
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: I will. But first we've got to get our source on.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: Our sources are John Brown by W. E. B. Dubois,
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: Fire from the Midst of You, Our Religious Life of
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: John Brown by Lewis A. De Caro, Jr. John Brown,
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: A Cry for Freedom by A. Laurence B. Gram John Brown,
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: Pennsylvania Citizen by Ernest Miller. The Life and Letters of
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: John Brown, Liberator of Kansas and Martyr of Virginia by
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: Franklin Benjamin in Sanborn. John Brown Abolitionist by David S. Reynolds.
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: John Brown eighteen hundred to eighteen fifty nine by Oswald
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: Garrison Villard. What John Brown Did in Kansas by Andrew Johnson,
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: originally published in the Congressional Globe the Official Proceedings of Congress,
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: The Secret Six John Brown and the Abolitionist Movement by
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: Otto Scott. Encyclopedia of Slave Resistance and Rebellion by Junius P. Rodriguez.
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: I also have articles here from the Virginia newspaper The
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: Stanton Spectator from eighteen fifty nine. We also have our
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: old favorites Biography dot com, Smithsonian dot com, and History
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: dot com. I was it in comfortably good? Then it's begin.
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: John Brown was born on the ninth of May eighteen
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: hundred in Torrington, Connecticut. He was the fourth child of
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: Owen Brown, a tanner, and Ruth Mills, a teacher. Now
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: they were not the richest couple in the world, like
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: they were surviving, but they started off fairly low economically.
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: Fairly low economically is the best way to put it.
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: And so he's like the fourth of eight children, and
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: their family history, like they are. Their family history can
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: literally be traced back to the Mayflower. Like John Brown's,
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: like ancestors, like his patrilinial ancestors, came across on the Mayflower,
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: not like everybody who says their family's been here for
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: genial regions. We came over here on the mayflower. Well,
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: how big was this fucking boat, pal, because there seems
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: to be a good chunk. He who say that your
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: relatives came over on the mayflower? Yeah? Oh did your
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: ancestor do that? Yeah? Yeah, yeah, so he was descending
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: from them. They're pilgrims. And so Ruth, she's a teacher.
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah I already said that. And his dad, Owen, is
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: a tanner, and that is someone who tans, not like
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: their skin, but the skin of others. Not others cheese,
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: that would be m M animals. Okay. So you know
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: when you take the hide of of like a cow
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: or whatever, well you can tann that and that's what
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: makes it into leather. So yeah, it's the process of
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm gonna say, like weather proofing the skin,
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: because making it strong and sturdy and wearable. So that's
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: what he does. They are a religion family, as one
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: can tell by the amount of children. They have no
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: condoms for them, although couldn't we just like tan one,
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: I feel like he would possess the skill to make
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: a yield a time condom. When you think that they've
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: existed since what the I want to say, at least
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: the seventeen at least the sixteen hundreds because of King
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: Charles anyway, So yes, they have a bunch of kids.
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: They are religious, they are strict Calvinists. Now, Calvinists are
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: just one of the variations of Protestant. That sounded very dismissive,
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: but they're just like you know how the schism happened
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: in So you had like Orthodox Christians, and then you
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: had Catholics, and that was like the first like break.
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: And then the Catholics they split into like Protestant and Catholic,
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: and then the Protestants have like I had up at this,
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: Lutheran Calvinists. There's so many more. Why kind of think
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: of them? Why can't I think of them? Where are
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: they Presbyterian? The Presbyterians are really depressed in questions though,
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: because they can suck a color right out of a rainbow.
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: And you've got Baptists. Ha ha ha ha, there's more
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: like I used to be able to rhyme these off
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: my heart. So they all kinda split into all these
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: little splinter groups of Jesus loving and they all kind
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: of vary off. And then you get things like Jesuits
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: and the Mormons, the Church of latterday Saints and then
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: the cults happen, which you're all kind of related, so
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: they just it just kind of gets spread out like
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: a planogram that went too far. But anyway, that is
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: the case. They're Calvinists and they're very and they're also abolitionists,
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: so they believe that everyone is created equal, okay, and
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: they're like, hey, maybe it's not cool to own another person. Yeah,
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: it's like it's just like a vibe they have. They're like,
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: we shouldn't own other people because treating people like property
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: seems like it's in violation to the good word Overlord God.
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: Like you know, you know, I love the fact that
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: like I'm like, yes, yes, nomeb of those years you
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: spent in Sunday School, Katie. Yes, they're finally let me
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: tell you about Jesus friends waiting know with Jesus, he's like, hey,
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: don't be dicks to one another, all right, don't be
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: rich because it is easier for a camel to pass
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: through the eye of a needle than it is for
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: a rich man to get into heaven, which is one
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: of the reasons why as it marks, he called religion
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: the opiate of the poor. So, yeah, they're very they're
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: very forward thinking for the era. And this is why
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: I always get mad when people go it was a
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: different time when they try and like have a bigoted
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: opinion about something, like their argument is bullshit, because in
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: order for it to be like it was a different time,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: everyone was racist. No, they fucking weren't. Here's my proof,
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: your proof is, and you're pudding yea, and the pudding
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: is missed Brown. Okay, that's it. Like, that's how it is.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: And they're just they're very, very progressive for the time being.
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: And so as John is growing up, like it is
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: instilled in him this opinion that everybody's equal right, everybody
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: deserve the same chances, and to hold people in Boye
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: was a sin against God. And so John grows up
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: with this just deep rooted opinion and this understanding that
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: you can't own another person and that people deserve freedom
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: and basic rights and due process. So like, there's this
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: story that when John Brown was younger, he saw this
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: like southern clergyman of some kind, reverend, a minister whatever
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: he was, tried to reclaim freed slaves in Connecticut, and
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: him trying to do that just really pissed like little
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: John Brown off and he was like, yeah, no, no,
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: I'm not feeling that. I'm gonna I'm gonna say something
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: about this, which is interesting because people like to think
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: that they're going to stand up and do the right
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: thing when the time, you know, a time occurs. But
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: a lot of the time people are compliant in the silence,
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: like they don't want to rock the boat. They don't
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: want to put themselves out there, and there are so
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: many reasons for not putting yourself out there. I'm not
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: saying that everybody has to go out and make a scene,
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: but I think everybody has to make a stand in
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: some way, Like you have to know where your moral
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: line is. I say that as if bad people know
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: they other villains. Nobody thinks the other villain in the story.
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: Everyone who thinks that they are righteous and whatever they're
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: doing is right for them, Like you can twist things
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: in your brain to convince yourself, but like everybody thinks
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: they're doing the right thing, which is really hard when
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: you're trying to teach people basic empathy. But yeah, a
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: lot of people are silent and they're compliant, and they're like, oh,
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: he's trying to reclaim his slaves. I mean that that's
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: a thing he's doing. I'm not going to get in
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: the way. I'm not going to put myself in the
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: line of fire here, which is like, no, he can't
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: just say he owns these people because he wants them.
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: Like so anyway about this incident, John says that since
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: he was raised an abolitionist, he's gonna die an abolitionist,
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: which is like such such strong words and opinions from
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: someone so young. But like when he's five, the family
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: moved to the frontier, like out on the range, which
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: is like Hudson, Ohio. I think at this point that's
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: where they're at, and it's still part of the range,
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: and so they move there. And here Owen Brown sets
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: up a tannery, a successful tannery at that it does well.
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: He's doing well. And so the family are there in
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: this area on the frontier, Hudson, Ohio. And surrounding them
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: in the area are Dundon Dun people indigenous to the land.
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: That's right, Native Americans were living on Native American land
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: and the Browns are living there and they get on
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: well with the Native Americans because they show each other respect,
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: because you know, that's what God says to do. You're
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: supposed to respect your fellow man. And so they're like,
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: you're just pretty chill with one another and Owen even
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: though the family they're, you know, they're very religious. They're
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: like super religious, but religious in the way that you know,
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: you have to be peace and kindness to all on
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: earth as opposed to, you know, let me force my
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: religion and its rules down your throat and upon your
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: people to whom it has no bearing or meaning, you know,
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: you know, And so they do that and they live
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: harmony for quite a while. And John he's lived there
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: from the age of five, and so he's raised in
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: this community with these Native Americans. And John he spends
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: time with herdsman and he called them Indians. So he
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: spends his time there and they teach him how to
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: like shoot and ride and to herd cattle and own.
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: They're doing sort of like a bartering system, so he'd
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: exchange bread and meal for like turkey, fish and venison,
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: which is deer meat for those of you who don't know.
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: So they're just like trading with one another, and so
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: we John from the age of five, he's raised amongst
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: Native Americans. He's being too hard to dress skins and
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: shoot and herd cattle alone, like alone, and like they
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: end up calling him like buckskins, so he's like like
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: just one of them. It just shows that he's welcomed
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: into their community. And so he's raised with this care
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: and affection for these people because he knew them as
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: his friends, as his neighbors, as his community. And so
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: meanwhile he's having this very like strict religious like upbringing.
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: And so John he's having a really decent upbringing, especially
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: for the era, and things are going great, well comparatively,
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: they're going great for him until he's eight years old.
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: Because this is history and so bad things happen. And
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: so when he's eight, his mother dies in childbirth, which
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: was I think the most common cause of death for
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: what throughout history, or I think the other causes men.
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: So one of those two are the top causes of
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: death of women throughout history, men and childbirth. And with
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: the death of his wife, Owen was now a man
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: in the eighteen hundreds, lived with six children to care
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: for in race. So a year later he gets remarried
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: to a twenty one year old With him, he would
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: have eight more children, that is fourteen children. That is like,
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry, at least ten children. Too many. That's a
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: lot of kids. That's too many kids. But yeah, they
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: just kept just kept popping them out. Now, John he
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: never really got on with his stepmother, Like she wasn't
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: like cruel to him. There wasn't like a big bad situation.
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: But they they just didn't gel. And so he spent
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: as much of his time outdoors as possible. So you know,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: he's herding, he's shooting, he's dressing skins, he's learning to
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: tan said skins. And he spends a lot of time
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: like in the forest contemplating. He even has I think
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: a pet squirrel at one point, and yeah, he's running
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: about in buckskin. First I had to google what buckskin
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: firs were because I've never held this before, like I've
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: heard of it. But I in my head, I'm just
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: like Cowboy, Like my brain just goes Cowboy wears buckskin furs,
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: which a buck is like a young dr right and
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: in it hang on, hang on, yep, No, it's exactly
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: what I thought. It was exactly what I have thought.
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: It was Lewis and Clark, Like Lewis and Clark. That's
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: that's the image I have in my head. That's the
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: one the fringe and the leather and the fire little hats.
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: That's that's what he's wearing. And he's herding cattle for
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: what one hundred miles, like at the age of twelve.
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: Like he does that at the age of twelve, and
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: him and his pet squirrel, I don't know, was the
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: squirrel herding the cattle with him? That is a good cartoon.
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: I'm just saying, you're welcome. Whoever makes that idea, You're welcome,
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: just like the squirrel herding cattle. Can you imagine though,
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: that'd be a good one. That would be a good
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: one because you've got like the young fella dressed like
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: Lewis and Clark trying to herd cattle and they come across,
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: you know, mischief and various dangers that all end up
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: with a moral store in the end, and they all
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: grow his characters and the real herding with the friends
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: they made along the way. But like he really is
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: like really, I don't want to say, really good friends
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: with a squirrel. Yeah, yeah, yeah, he was really good
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: friends with a squirrel. He had a squirrel as a pet, right,
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: he had a squirrel as a pet, and when it
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: died as animals want to do. He mourned for I shit,
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: you not two years over his pet squirrel. Now I'm
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: not here to come between a person and their furry friend,
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: but two years does seem about excessive. But anyway, oh
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: my god, I completely forgot to mention his grandparents, like
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: his maternal and paternal grandfathers, Like they were both involved
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: in the War of Independence. Like his maternal grandfather he
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: was like a general and the Revolutionary Army, and then
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: the other one also did stuff. But like, yeah, yeah,
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: they were all like super involved and it just they
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: were like super into freedom. Just forgot to mention that.
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: But anyway, back to the boy with the dead squirrel.
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: So war happens again because in eighteen twelve, America went
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: to war with England, and so the Brown family they
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: contracted with the military and so they provided you know, horses,
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: cattle and like other provision and so Owen Brown he's
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: like really active during this time, and he's sort of
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: up and about getting stuff together for the military. And
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: John is like, I don't like this. He's not keen
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: on the army and what the army's doing. He's just
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: not feeling it because the military men they're not the
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: most polite of people, and what is it? He doesn't
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: like military fails. He did not like and I'm going
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: to quote him the profanity, disobedience and mutinous talk of
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: the soldiers. Like he's just like, what are they doing?
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: Like where are their prayers? Okay? Why are they talking
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: about mutiny? He's like nu uh uh. And so he's
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: not really into war or armies and such. And for
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: a while he's just like, mmm, okay, I remember he's
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: what still young because he's twelve, because it's eighteen twelve
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: and he was born in the eighteen hundreds. The math
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: for this is nice and easy. I like when someone
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: is born in a nice zero year and it makes
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: my life easier. And so while all this stuff's happened
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: and his dad's like moving around doing this, he needs
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: to be somewhere and he doesn't like a stepmom, So
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: so he ends up staying with a United States Marshal,
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: Like his dad just put some there, and so he's
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: there with the marshall. And so under the care of
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: this US Marshal, John has treated fairly well. He has clothed, fed,
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: he is, you know, having a fairly regular time of it.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: Like in my head, like considering the religion the era,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: and you know, the sort of society of the time,
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: corporal punishment was very much of the norm. So it
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: wouldn't be surprised if John Brown had a lashing or two.
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: Which brings me to John Brown's friend. So he befriended
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: a child who was round about his age, who he
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: met at the US Marshall's because the marshall owned him.
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: This was a slave boy that he befriended. Because this
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: is John Brown. He was raised amongst Native Americans. He
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: was raised to believe that all men were created equal,
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: you know, and that this was just how it was,
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: you know, you were supposed to care for one another,
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: like that's the golden rule of God. And he noticed
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: the disparity fairly quickly. He saw that this black boy was,
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: you know, insufficiently fed, dressed, and that he didn't really
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: have anywhere decent to sleep when it was cold, when
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: the bad weather came, and when it came to beatings.
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: And like we can, you know, fairly reasonably assume that
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: John was on the receiving end of a cane once
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: in a while. But this enslave child, he was beaten
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: with iron shovels. Like anything is a weapon. If you
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: think hard enough, with you know enough determination, anything's a weapon.
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: He saw the way his friend was beaten and mistreated
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: and treated as subhuman, and it fucking disgusted him. He
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: hated it. He was horrified by what he was seeing,
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: and this led him to declare an eternal war on slavery.
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: In eighteen sixteen, John Brown is studying at a school
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: in Massachusetts that's known for like channa out missionaries, preachers,
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: all that jazz. He's studying onto a reverend because like
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: sort of primary elementary school, there wasn't really anything like
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: for them after that, and so this was one of
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: the choices. So he's very much thinking of becoming a
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: preacher because he's like very religious. He's you know, he
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: has this deep instilled like religious morality, which is like
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: probably closer to what morality should be as opposed to
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: things today. And so he ends up going to Connecticut,
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: where his cousin's from, and he goes to the Morris
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: Academy and he's like, he's, you know, gonna go on,
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: He's gonna become a missionary. He's gonna become a preacher,
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: and he's gonna devote his life to religion, and so
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: he goes this place, he's at the Morris Academy. He's
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: gonna he's gonna do it, right, He's gonna do it.
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: And so he's studying under Jeremiah Hallock in Connecticut and
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: then he ends up going to Plainfield in Massachusetts to
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: Moses Hallock. And he's getting ready for college. And he's
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: supposed to go on to Amherst College and become like
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: a proper big preacher man. But then he gets an
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: eye issue. So he gets like an eye infection, and
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: it's like a chronic eye infection. So he's supposed to
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: go and do this, but this eye infection is so bad,
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: like it's such a problem that he simply cannot continue
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: to study. And so he ends up going back home
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: to Hudson, Ohio, where he teaches himself how to survey
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: from a book. So he just learns to be a surveyor,
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: because you know, that's a thing that needs done. People
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: need to survey the land. Like cartography, you know, was
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: not what it is today, Like there's no ordinance surveys
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: going on, you know, not yet anyway, and you need
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: to figure out like what's out there, and so this
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: is a very decent sort of position to have. And
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: you can remember as well. He's also trained in you know, tanning.
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: He can tan hides. So he's got these skills, Okay,
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: So he can survey, you know, he can herd sheep
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: and cattle, he can tan the hide of sheep and cattle.
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: He can befriend a squirrel. And he grows to be
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: a very I don't want to say domineering, because domineering
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: is wrong, but he grows up to be sort of
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: a dominating, dominating figure because he's like over six feet tall,
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: Like he is a tall man. He's tall, he's fairly strong,
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: because you know, it's the eighteen hundreds and one has
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: to be to do the stuff he's doing. But he
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: is a fine specimen of a man. Or so does
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: Diantha Lusk Dianther. I'm gonna call her Dianther. That just
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: seems correct. So he marries at the age of t
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: Diantha Lusk, and she is the daughter of his housekeeper.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: So I mean, maybe it was just like, hey, have
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: you considered getting married to him? Have you seen Diantha?
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: Like maybe it's just Dianthe Dianthe I like Diantha. It
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: just sounds like more fun. It's like you need a wife,
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: here's one. So yeah, and like she is. She is
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: described thusly remarkably playing but near industrious and an economical girl. Like, yeah,
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: she's industrious and economical. Well, she's doing something right because
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: the two of them, they have over the course of
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: eleven years, they have seven children. Now, John Brown being
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: raised as he was, the religious zealism, it's in there,
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: it's definitely in there, because he believed that corporal punishment. Yeah,
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: it's a thing. It's a deep rooted issue. And so
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: initially he thought that his children's disobedience, like the way
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: that they were acting out or talking back or anything
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: like that, anything they rude or mischievous, any of that
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: like that was a direct result of his own sins,
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: like he had sinned and therefore his kids or dicks
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: like that was the opinion he had. And so he
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: would he would kill the children, like they'd get the rod.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: And he would do this for years. Like at one
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: point even like his oldest son, like he has a
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: book which is effectively balances and checks of like here
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: are the good things you did, here are the bad
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: things you did. Like, here are you know, every wrong
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: thing you did, and here is the punishment you shall
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: receive because of it. And so at one point he
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: shows his son the book and he's like like, at
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: the sinning you get to get you know, the rod,
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: And so they do that and he goes, oh, it's
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: not quite balancing out. You've got more debit than credit.
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: And then he makes the sun like like whip him
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: to like give him lashes, Like, yeah, that's this is
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: the time before therapy existed, so I'm not saying anything there.
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: Over the years, though, John Brown realized that corporal punishment
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: was not the way forward and that there were more
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: appropriate punishments for the children that did not involve whipping them,
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: which is good. Like we love to see growth, you know,
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: we love to see someone realize that their behaviors or
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: actions were harmful and that they need to change those
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: behaviors and be more positive in their actions. So yay,
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: yay for learning. And he's a pretty decent dad too.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: Beatings aside, that's a sentence I never thought i'd have
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: to say, Why am I kidding? This is history. This
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: is definitely a sentence I thought i'd have to say.
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: So like at one point, though, like his kids are sick,
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: like scarlet fever is making the rounds, and so he's
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: staying up like all night with the children. He's like
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: stalking the fire because it's the only way to like
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: keep the house warm. So he's making sure that, you know,
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: his children are okay throughout the night. Like he's he's,
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: you know, doing more than a lot of modern fathers do.
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: It's like, will you get up and feed the baby? Nope?
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: What the fuck? Man? This guy's doing like tanning and
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: shepherding and child saving, like like if he can do
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: this in the eighteen hundreds, you can give a baby
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: a bottle. Now I'm just saying Meanwhile, back to the Browns,
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: there is a shortage of ministers in Ohio, like there
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: was a complete lack of ministers, and so Owen Brown,
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: John Brown's father helped set up the Western Reserve College
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: and Preparatory School in Hudson. Now, at one point, Ireland
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: had just a surplus of priests. They were everywhere, always
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: trying to preach God and opening your cupboards and like
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: a priest would fall out. There's just so many right
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: sweeping down the street that can priests fall out the bit,
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: just priests everywhere, and so we had to send them away,
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: but clearly we didn't send them to Hudson, Ohio. So anyway,
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: David Hudson, who was the founder of the school, was
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: a staunch abolitionist, and this school became a major stop
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: on the underground Railroad. And so not only that, not
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: only that, but Owen Brown would then open up his
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: house for formerly enslaved or the enslaved people, just anyway,
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: those who were escaping the sith. And so it became
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: part of the underground Railroad, and Hudson became so well
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: known that they actually put a sign up outside the
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: city saying like you know, this is the road to Hudson,
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: Like this is it. And so John decides that he's
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: going to also be involved in the underground Railroad. Now
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: in eighteen twenty five, he ends up in Randolph, Pennsylvania.
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: Now he is appointed postmaster by President Andrew Jackson, who
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: I don't know is he the most racist of president
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure which president was the most racist, but
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: I feel like Andrew Jackson was definitely in the top three.
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: So anyway, he is appointed postmaster, so he's in charge
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: of the post office. And so John Brown moves to Pennsylvania.
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: He's in Randolph. He clears twenty five acres of land
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: and then builds a tannery, a two story tannery with
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: like sunken vats, and it's got like a barn, and
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: he's got a cabin so like the barn itself, it
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: was well ventilated. It had a trap door that was
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: so well hidden that you know, you could be standing
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: on top of it and not see it. Like it
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: was very well hidden like in this barn, and a
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: secret rooms had like a secret room in there as well.
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: And so fugitives like this would become a stop for
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: them on the railroad. See John Brown. What he would
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: do is he would help transport what we're then known
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: as runaway slaves. So he would hide them in the
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: wagon that he would use to move mail like and
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: stuff for his tannery and his survey equipment. Will get
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: to that in a way second. And for ten years
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: it was an important stop on the railroad. And John
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: Brown he is like the pillar of the community. Like
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: he's so important. He's out surveying lands, he's getting schoolhouses built.
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: He's bringing in like ministers and preachers and he's just
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: really like really building the community of this town. Right.
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: So he's he's got businesses going on, he's bringing people in,
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: he's like giving out books like to people. He's like,
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: read things. It's gonna be great. And he's really like
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: the moral back bone of this town because he would
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: sort of question new settlers, like white settlers when they
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: were coming. He was like, you know, support the Sabbath,
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: are you like godly people? You know, are you opposed
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: to slavery? You know all of those things. He's like, Okay, cool,
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: you're good. You can come stay in our town. And
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: he is so well thought of in the community that
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: that if you were speaking well with someone, if you
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: were like really wanted to praise them, you would say
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: he was as entertaining and honest as John Brown. And
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: of course this is history, so things are gonna get
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: worse before they get better if they do get better.
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: And in eighteen thirty two, John's wife, Diane dies at
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: the age of thirty, giving birth to their seventh child.
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: Now there are sort of rumors, sort of a swirl
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: about what she was like, Like there were suggestions that
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: she had some form of mental illness and that some
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: of the children showed similar signs to that mental illness
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: and that she had a deposition to insanity as she
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: got older. But anyway, one year later him and his
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: dad have similar similar parents here. So one year later
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: John Brown with six children to his name. Mary's sixteen
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: year old Mary and Day. He's thirty three, the same
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: age Jesus was allegedly's when he was put up upon
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: the cross. So yeah, Mary and Day, who was only
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: four years older than John's oldest son, John Junior. And
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: remember how Dantha was like in streets and economical, Well,
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: Mary Anne, catch you if you can, Mary Anne, she's
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: her wrong biggest fan, Marianne. She was a large silent girl,
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: no I'm gonna do the voice, a large silent girl
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: of rugged physical health. And even with her rugged ruggedness
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: in nature I'm sorry, ruggedness in nature, she also got
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: her buckskins on and out chatting to squirrels. I mean
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: she's only sixteen, she might have been, so yeah, yeah, anyway,
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: as John ages, what I would expect this one gets older,
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: allegedly is that you become more conservative. He just ends
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: up digging his heels in and becoming like more of
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: an abolitionist somehow, Now, John he was initially a supporter
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: of the Wigs. So the Whig Party Whig not to
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: be confused with Legs and the Concervatives, the radicals, to perlatives,
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: the liberals and to Rais and all the Balikru police
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: in the exhilarate, the Garrison Artillery, the Second Inner Skillings
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: and the lifeguards too. Not then See, there was a
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: slave owner called Henry Clay and John Brown absolutely despised
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: the man. And so when he took in this like
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: larger part of arder role in the Whig Party, John
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: Brown was like, no, I'm not involved in this, and
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: he hated Democratic Republican slaveholder. Andrew Jackson definitely one of
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: the top three racist presidents, if not the most racist.
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: Maybe I don't know. I don't know that new ones maybe.
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: So after this he opposed like politics and just straight
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: up stopped voting in the presidential elections all together. And
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: that's like after the eighteen thirties, and he's just like
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: protesting it. He's like, I'm not voting, which is not
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: not what you do. Not voting is not a good idea.
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: You have to vote carefully, you have to slide it.
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: You have to vote carefully and logically in order to
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: ensure that the opposition does not win. Like that's it,
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: it's just maths. And so for like the ten or
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: so years that he's in Randolph, like his barn is
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: like a major stop on the railroad, and it is
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: estimated that he had saved about two and a half
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: thousand enslaved people. And so he's just he's just a
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: good dude, you know what I mean, He's trying to
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: do what's right. And so he ends up hiring this couple,
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: a black couple, it's relevant to you know, you know,
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: work around the house, help him with his business, you know,
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: jobs as we call them. And so he invites them
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: to church, you know, to come to Sunday service with
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: him and his family. And so he gets a church
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: and they show up, and then they are seated like
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: at the back of the church, like the other doors,
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: like way at the back. And John Brown's like, that's
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: a bit odd. And so the very next Sunday he
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: invites them to sit in his pew with him, and
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: so the entire congregation is so aghast, and this black
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: couple are sitting in the pews in the church in
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: the House of God, that they're just upset and enraged
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: and shocked, and they're being really shitty about it. Even
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: the minister is angry. The man of God himself, right,
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: he's pissed off. And two of John's sons are like
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: so aware of what's happening, and they're so pissed off
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: that everyone around them being such our souls, that they
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: just get up leave the church and never join another
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: church again. They're like, ah, sorry, if it's religion for all,
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: our religion for none. Get lost, and off they go.
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: And so the entire Brown family gets a letter from
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: the church saying they are expelled. They are expelled from
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: the church, and it's like, a, are we now because
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: we brought black people to your church? Is that what
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: it is? All right there, holy man? And like it's
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: at this point where the whole concept of organized religion
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: just doesn't sit right with John Brown anymore, which is
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: how he becomes an evangelical Christian, which get a bad
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: rap nowadays because for fair reason. But like when I
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: was initially told the story of John Brown and how
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: he was an evangelical Christian, my friend had said he
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: is the only good evangelical Christian, and I was like, Hey,
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: how dare you Ambolin? Amberlin was an evangelical Christian, right, So,
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: one of the core things about evangelicalism, like at least initially,
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: is that it's internal, like you're supposed to pray to
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: God and believe God and do all that stuff in
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: your own way, like you're supposed to do it, like
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: for you not to show boat. Right anyway, two two
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: good evangelicals find me a third that she says to
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: the Internet. So we've got John Brown and we've got
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: Amblin fight me. Meanwhile, John Brown is approached by white
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: people and they're like, hey, there's Native Americans in this
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: area in which they are native to and we just
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: don't want the mare. Can you help us? And He's like,
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: ah ha, And I might be paraphrasing here, but he
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: says eat glass. No, yeah, well, I see. Basically, a
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: bunch of white families come up to him and they're like,
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: get rid of this, you know, Indian problem. And John
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: what he actually says is I would sooner take my
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: gun and help you drive you out of the country,
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: which is as fair fair, or as I paraphrased, eat glass. Honestly,
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: sometimes I just want to tell people on the internet
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: to eat glass, but I know my account will be
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: like shut down the moment I do. So. Anyway, things
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: are not going as well for him in this town anymore.
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: That he is like the pillar of and so in
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: eighteen thirty five, did I say nineteen thirties earlier? No?
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: We did not skip forward in an entire century? Did I?
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: I may have? Eighteen thirty five, John Brown moves back
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: to Franklin Mills, Ohio to start a tanning business with
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: a local businessman, Zenus Kent. So at the same time,
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: his father Owen is basically he's basically having issues at
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: the Western Reserve College campus because you've got the students
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: are part of one group and faculty is part of another.
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: And basically like one side they're very much just like emancipation,
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: like immediate emancipation, and the other side are like black people,
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: we should like colonize, colonize first and then gentle gentle. Yeah. Yeah,
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: it's like they're free, but they're not equal. That's the
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: whole thing about colonizing. It's like they're free, but there's
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: still not the same as us, which is what Lincoln
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: wanted for the record, But like the thing about Abraham Lincoln.
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: That everyone forgets or is informed about misinformed about, is
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: that whatever the majority voted for is what was going
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: to happen. Like if people hadn't, you know, wanted the
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: emancipation of black people, the Emanginmation Proclamation wouldn't have happened.
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: He would have done whatever the majority wanted, Like this
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: wasn't his personal endeavor, Like this was not for him
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: anyway anyway. Owen Brown, He's just like so done with
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: this situation and he wants equality for everybody. And so
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: he ends up leaving Western Reserve, bloody, bloody black and
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: joining the Oberlin Collegiate Institute, which was incredibly, incredibly super
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: progressive because it was an anti slavery institute that accepted
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: black people and women and possibly because I didn't look
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: up possibly black women who knew could you imagine, Like
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: everybody's free, everybody's welcome. And so the Operlin College it
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: became so so successful in aiding enslaved people that was
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: known to never lose a fugitive slave to federal authorities.
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: So on top of this, John Brown's dad he set
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: up a dissident pro abolition church called Free Church, and
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: he helped the Western Reserve anti slavery society, like his
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: dad is continuously going. He's also remarried, like he married
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: a widow at this point because like wife number one died,
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: with number two died, he married withfe number three. And
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: this one sticks, I think. And things are continuing to
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: heat up in the US after the Four Day Slave
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: Rebellion Nat Turner's Four Day Slave Rebellion, Like Southerners are
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: terrified there's going to be another uprising, and it just
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: creates this like fear and panic, and it results in
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: Elijah Lovejoy, who is an anti slavery editor in Illinois.
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: He was murdered in eighteen thirty seven, and Lincoln calls
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: it the most important single event that has ever happened
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: in the New World. Sorry, Abraham Lincoln was known to
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: have a high pitched voice. And that's the best you're
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: getting off me tonight. So yeah, Elishah Lovejoy's murderer, the
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: anti slavery editor, where he was fatally shot by a
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: pro slavery mob, like led to many more pro slavery
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: mobs just sort of rising up like across the US,
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: Like they're taking all that fear and rage and they're
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: just aiming it directly at Northern abolitionists, like they're so
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: fueled by just anger and fear and they're just attacking,
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: you know, people who are trying to do something good.
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: And so this is where anti slavery politics come into it,
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: because like Lincoln, he didn't see like violence as the
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: answer to this, like it had to be solved, you know, politically,
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: because if everyone's aggressive and just mobs, if you're just
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: rabble rabble mobs all the time, like shit's not going
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: to get done and you're you're not going to be
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: able to govern anything because you know, won't be anything
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: to govern because everything will just be ash, rubble and ash.
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: So back in Hudson, there is a Lovejoy memorial meeting
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: and John and Owen Brown go together and so people,
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: you know, they're all condemning this. They're saying, like, you know,
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: the pro slavery mobs, they can't do this. This is
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: just a terrible act of human nature. And John ends
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: up standing up, like raising his right hand and declared,
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: like loudly proclaimed here before God in the presence of
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: these witnesses. From this time, I consecrate my life to
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: the destruction of slavery and his dad. Oh, and he
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: stands beside him and he's just crying like he's feeling
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: big feelings, Like obviously, because this is just a big deal.
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: It is a huge deal in this crowd, they don't
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: see pasifism as the means to go on. Because here's
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: the thing, it would be great to solve the world's
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: problems and solve wars with non violent action and pacifism.
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: But like when you're trying to deep with an oppressive force, like,
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: what is your option to violence? Magic? Is it magic?
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: Because unfortunately, unfortunately as well, it's always the people at
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: the bottom of the ladder that are going to get
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: hurt the most by any movement, And it fucking sucks.
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: It's terrible, it's atrocious, and it doesn't matter because people
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: are going to get hurt. Well, it doesn't matter. But
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: like it doesn't matter what you do, it doesn't matter
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: what route you take. There's going to be suffering. The
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: only choice is to try and reduce that, and you
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: do that via community. Community is the only non violent
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: action because you have to support each other and care
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: for each other and consider each other, like you need
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: bonds in friendship and support. And I'm getting very angry
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: about this, and I need to calm down because I
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: have neighbors, but like being there for each other. There's
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: this whole thing about how the left tells itself apart
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: for you know, oh you're not good enough for doing this,
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: this is performative blah blah blah blah blah blah blah,
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: when like we should be standing together to like fight
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: the fucking enemy. Like that's the thing, and it's community.
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: It's helping each other, it's providing support. That is what's
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: gonna It's gonna help through, help get through, like sidebar.
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: I remember, I remember watching a piece about the war
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: in Ukraine and there was like a conscription and like
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: men of a certain age were to sign up for
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: military service and people were flying home for it. They
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: were flying home to protect their country. And you had
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: like eighty year old men who were not allowed to
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: like sign up, they weren't allowed to fight because you're
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: like you're eighty, you know, And they're just sitting there
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: like making molotov cocktails, like they're preparing because they're like
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna do fucking something now. I'm not saying everyone
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: needs to go out and make molotov cocktails. But you
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: you need to be the Molotov cocktail in this situation,
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: like you need to do something like we have to
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: support each other and we have to help each other
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: regardless of our continent, right, regardless of our religious filiations,
• 54:53
  Speaker 1: you know, regardless if we have them or don't have them,
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: or you know, whether you follow nihilism RBS or I
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: was gonna be like a sadomascism, Like that's not right.
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: That's a different conversation for a different day. But yeah,
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: the whole point is that you support people because we're
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: supposed to be making things better, because otherwise, what's the
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: fucking point, Like, what's the point If you want things
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: to be shitty, that's a you problem and you need therapy.
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: But like, we're supposed to make things better for everybody,
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: because why not, you know. Anyway back to this, John
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: Brown goes to his family and he asks them, he
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: urges them actually to wage war against slavery and break
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: the jaws of the wicked and pluck the spoil out
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: of their teeth. Which he has a way with words,
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: like whatever that preaching college did way back when he
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: was good at words. So at the same time he's
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: like he's trying to have this really powerful moment and
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: like things are going for him in one way in
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: another way business wise, not not at the top of
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: the pops, to be honest, He's got like he's trying to,
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: you know, fight for abolition, he's trying to fight against slavery.
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: And so for five years between like what eighteen thirty
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: seven and eighteen forty two, he's he's setting up like
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: cattle businesses, will businesses, a farm called Westlands, a real
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: estate scheme. He's got credit and state bonds, and things
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: are not going well because the panic of eighteen thirty
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: seven it basically triggers a major depression across the entire US,
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: and John loses nearly all of his money and nearly
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: all of his properties and across the country due to
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: mass speculation. Six hundred banks fail, they just implode, And
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: so you've got labor reformers and they are yelling and
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: screaming about class division and slaves to wages, right wage slaves,
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: I believe is the term they use. And this just
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: triggers something and John it makes them even more pissed off.
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: So you've got this capitalist system which is just crushing
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: people down. You've got all these banks that have just closed.
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: He's in debt, and what he's thinking about is not
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: only this, but the fact that enslaved people are just
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: cogs in this system, and that their existence was merely
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: for personal wealth to boost the personal wealth of others.
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: And like he is mad, but he's still optimistic. I'm
• 58:01
  Speaker 1: gonna go with optimistic. And so his creditors they fell
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: suits against him, and he's like, gonna herd some cattle.
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: So it takes them from Hudson to Connecticut and it
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: sells them to Wordsworth in Wales, and so he takes
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: that money, goes to Boston and so he gets there,
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: he meets three guys he used to know, and he's
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: been wearing the same clothes on this what long trek
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: between Hudson and Connecticut, and he's like, hey, can I
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: get a loan? And they're like, we'll think about it.
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: His mind, that means yes. Now, anyone who's ever had
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: someone say they'll consider something, usually that means no, says
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: mute tells you, well, I'll think about it all the time,
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: and usually I'm like, yeah, yeah. I've had to stop
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: saying yes to things though, because not out of anything,
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: but like I have become aware that people make plans
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: with no intention of following through on plans, whereas when
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: I make a plan, I'm following through on the plan.
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: Like that's I should say, I am as a person.
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: If we make plans, I assume that's going ahead, which
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: which has caused me much upset in many years. So
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: he's still confident with these loans that he buys one
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: hundred and thirty dollars worth of sheep and he takes
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: them back to Ohio and yeah, yeah, A couple months
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: go by and no money comes in, and he owes
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: twenty thousand dollars, which I think in today's money is
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: over half a million, so it's over five hundred and
• 59:48
  Speaker 1: fifty thousand dollars. And so he takes like another head
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: of carol to Connecticut, sells them, goes back to Boston
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: and he's like, hey, where's my loan into like these
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: business dudes, and they're like, John, we're not giving you
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: a loan, And so he borrows money from wards within
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: wells without telling them he's borrowing money, which I think
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: is known as theft, but he takes it. He takes
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: five and a half thousand dollars and he takes it
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: to pay off his debt or some of his debt,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: and it's not long before Wadalin Wells realize that five
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: and a half thousand dollars is missing, and so they
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: threaten to have John arrested, and John's he just lies.
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: He's like, yeah, he's got money coming from Boston, and
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: they're like okay, because they believe him because it's John Brown,
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: the pillar of the community, and so yeah, he's not
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: doing well financially, shall we say. And so he meets
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: George Kellogg who's an agent at a will company in Connecticut,
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: and he'd heard all about John, like ha'ser surveyor and
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: I heard her andy will expert. And he says he'll
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: give John an advance of two thousand and eight hundred dollars,
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: and so he gives him twenty hundreds advance on will,
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: so that John was to bring it from Ohio. So
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: John's getting the money first, and then John's going to
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: go to Ohio and then he's going to bring will.
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: So instead of doing that, John gives the money to
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: Wads with him Wells, and then he goes back to
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: Ohio and then George Kellogg finds out sends a really
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: really incensed letter about it, and John is like, hey,
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: I did it, this is what happened. Sorry, And then
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: like a few weeks later, George Kellogg writes that, you know,
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: the money issues are probably because of the depression, and
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: like the you know, the struggle everyone's happening, and he's
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: concerned about John's character, like you're struggling, pal, you need
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: a hand, like like he's Robin Peter to play Paul here,
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: Like that's that's what's happening. And so John ends up
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: paying back George Kellogg like for the rest of his life,
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: Like he's paying like little bits back to him. And
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: like like when John's forty years old, his father, he Owen,
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: he tries to convince him to move to Virginia because
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: like the land is cheap, you know, you could do
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: well there. But Virginia, Virginia was a slave state and
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: the western border of it, it was full of poor
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: white families who rarely own slaves. And Owen knew that
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: like some landing be given to Oberlin College, and it
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: had been surveyed and it was a good opportunity for
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: Johnny convinced them to go there and do surveying, and
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: so he gets a dollar per day and a thousand
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: acres of land, you know, once he's all done. And
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: so John goes there, he does the surveying, and in
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: one month the job is done and he turns down
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: the land. Instead, he goes to start a cattle business
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: with Hem and Oviate and like a few months later,
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 1: like John changes his mind and he writes to the
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: Oberlin College asking if he can have his land, and
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: they're like, no, that ship has sailed, friends, and so
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: he sends an angry letter and like, so they start
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: negotiations and John gets a twenty nine dollars settlement in
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: the end, and so he's in well, he's drowning in
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 1: debt effectively, Like he started selling like farm equipment and
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: stuff from his house and all he had left was
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: like some land and part ownership of the Westlands farm.
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: Then because of the you know, insurmountable debt, the Ohio
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: Supreme Court ruled that he had to sell off the
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 1: western property to pay off a loan to and was
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: chamberlain and yeah, John legally had to agree to it,
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: even though it was like who underpriced, right, And he's
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: angry because you know, the price is so low, and
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: the bland it is good land, it's good working land,
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: and it's his like dream place. And so almost Chamberlain
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: comes takes over a land and John issues a trespass
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 1: word against him because he's got this friend who's like
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: a police person. He's a constable, right, and he's like,
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: is you have a warrant? And he's like okay, So
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 1: Chamberlain has to leave. And John writes them and like
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 1: he's like, please let me keep my farm, and and
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 1: shockingly enough, this does not work. And so John then
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: arms his three oldest sons, so John Jr. Jason, and
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: Owen who will nineteen seventeen and five respectively. And so
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: he had them in this log cut at the edge
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: of the farm and told them to shoot if they
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 1: saw anyone, which is basically her retaliation for him being
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: screwed over by the courts. And this dude who took
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: advantage of the situation bought the land for cheap and
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: just was being a bit of a dick about it.
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 1: But yeah, such his life. And so Chamberlain he ends
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: up like having a posse sent there to get you know,
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: things sorted. But as soon as they see the boys
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: with their guns. They're like no, no. A couple days later, though,
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 1: John and two of his sons were arrested and taken
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 1: to Akron jail. Now the other Akron jail, Acron jail.
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: Somebody would tell me how have mispronounced it? And so
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: one of them ends up like fleeing into the forest,
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 1: and like they don't end up staying in jail very
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: long because the sheriff doesn't feel like it's right to do,
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 1: you know, imprison someone for defending their own property. They're like, nah,
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: seems wrong, and so they're like be free. And so
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 1: Chamberlain is pieste. He goes back into the Westlands right
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: the farm, he tears down their log hut and so
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 1: this like long legal battle like ensues. So John he'd
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: like promised the property to like the studio of money too,
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 1: and so there was like this three way legal battle
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: and so eventually the court just gives it to Chamberlain
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: and John he's got nothing and he is broke, like
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: broke broke, like no money broke, and by eighteen forty two,
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: like he's so poor that like this is this is
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: the thing. The former postmaster not afold postage stamps. So
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: he fells for bankruptcy and he's got nothing. And this
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 1: is the list of the last of his possessions. Four
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: wooden pails, six bedsteads, a cracked pot, six old feather beds,
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: three bags, four milk pans, one tin can, two broken earthpots,
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: one pitchfork, four axes, one crowbar, one shovel, one glass bottle,
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: and two spinning wheels and eleven bibles. That's a lot
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 1: of bibells. And so now they are down to five beds.
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: So there's his wife, his twelve children, five beds. And yeah,
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: the following year, John was able to rent this week
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: cabin in Richfield and they you know, they were optim
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: they thought things were starting to go well again. But
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: this is the past and shit happens. Oh that was
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 1: a poor per time statement. So four of the children
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 1: end up dying from dysentery like the Oregon trail Man
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 1: like it's they die from dysentery, and ah, John said
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 1: that he had the desire to die, like he loses
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 1: four kids a few months after moving into this this place.
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: The following year, he meets Colonel Simon Perkins, who's a
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: sheep farmer, and he's like oh, John, let me give
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 1: you a break, And so he gets him a job
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: where he's basically like looking after the sheep, making sure
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 1: the will is all sorted and sent to where it
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: needs to go. And he ends up with this in
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: a house for John to rent for thirty dollars a year,
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 1: and so he spent a couple of years holding fifteen
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 1: hundred sheep, and like he's really really good at this,
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 1: like he knows the sheep so well he can like
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: name them, like he knows the difference between all of
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: these like hundreds upon hundreds of sheep. And because of this,
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 1: John starts to recover from his like previous severe financial issues.
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: And throughout of this he's still a part of the
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: underground Railroad, helping where he can. And three years later,
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 1: in eighteen forty seven, after getting this job, Frederick Douglas
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: like decides to go and visit him, and like they're
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 1: just so excited to have him there, and so like
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: the two of them en up chatting for hours and hours,
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: and like at one point, John has this massive map
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 1: of the US across the table and it's got like
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 1: the apple Achian mountain range in it, and he's like,
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 1: these are really handy. You've got natural forts, hiding places,
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 1: you know, girrilla warfare, Like he's basically describing girrilla warfare.
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 1: And he tells him of this like plan to invade
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: like the Southern States with like men' sput into different
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 1: groups and you know, raid plantations and do all this.
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: And I'm Freddy Frederick Douglas. He's like, this seems a
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: bit much. Don't know if that'll like work? Is running
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: way to do it peacefully? And John Brown's like, no, no,
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: simply no. And so like it's just a way of
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: like going down. It's kind of like the game Lemmings.
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 1: You can add not lemmings, but yet you go in,
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 1: you attack, you like pull people out of the plantations,
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 1: make them join your army, and then you just slowly
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 1: build up an army, come back down and just until
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 1: you completely roll the wrist, you know. Because like the
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: goal was not just to like weaken these plantations or
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: bring them to the ground or whatever, but to weaken
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: the institution of slavery right and to have these anti
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 1: slavery attacks. And it was just what would have to
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 1: be done right, because they needed to make a point,
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: they needed to make a stand and they needed to
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 1: like remove the power that the people who were enslaving
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: other people had. And like John Brown had been planning
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: this for two decades, Like he had been going over
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 1: this plan for such a long period of time, and
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 1: it was based on a combination of like Nat Tunnel's
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: rebellion and also like Native American attack formations. Like it
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: was a combination of these like two factors that he
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 1: had studied and considered and thought through for again two decades.
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 1: This is throughout him being you know, in debt and
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 1: struggling and everything in between. And it was like really
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 1: was impressive. It was an impressive plan really, but violence
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 1: wasn't all John was into it, right, He ended up
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 1: helping establish this multicultural community in New York up in
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 1: North Elba And it was supposed to be like a
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 1: self sustaining farming town, which was for this able to
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: like survive, you know and hopefully thrive. However, the white
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 1: people who lived adjacent didn't like this idea, and so
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 1: they were overcharging you know, fugitives, formally enslaved people, all
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: people of color. Right, They're just like no, they're not
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: having this, and so they're just like charging this huge
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 1: amount of money for this stuff. And so the people there,
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 1: the black people there, were starving and struggling, and so
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 1: John was transporting flower and pork and bringing over to
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: this community and distributing it equally amongst all of these
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 1: black families. And then the following year, during the following year,
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 1: he moves to North Elbow with his family. He surveyed
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: the lands. It's just a useful skill, right, So he
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 1: salveys the lands and he helps like farming, he helps
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: set up like better access to resources, and he becomes
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: like friends with the people who live there. And this
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: is his community and it's like his favorite place he's
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 1: ever lived, and he wants to be buried there, and
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 1: so he is happy there for i year. Because in
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: eighteen fifty the Fugitive Slave Act is passed by Congress,
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 1: and what this did was give federal authorities the power
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 1: to reclaim fugitive slaves in the North. And so John
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: was cross, he was angry. Some might even go as
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 1: far as to call him livid. And so his wil warehouse,
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 1: he decides to convert it into a station for the
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: underground railroad. And in eighteen fifty one, just one year
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: after this, he arms forty five black men. This is
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 1: a combination of three black men, and they formerly enslaved
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: the fugitives, if you will. And so they establish the
• 1:15:47
  Speaker 1: League of Gileatus I think it's Gilliatus. And he gives them,
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 1: he gives them arms, he arms them, he gives them
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 1: guns effectively, and he tells them to attack any Southerners,
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 1: slave catchers, or federal marshals. And so he's just got
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 1: he's just got a posy here, right and and this
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 1: is the first militarized abolitionist group specifically created by a
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 1: white man in American history, right and so and and John,
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 1: he's equal opportunity. So he invites everybody to be like
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 1: part of this league. So you've got every black person, male, female, young, old,
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 1: like everybody. And it's like listen, you know, if stuff happens,
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 1: you know, we all need to be on board. You
• 1:16:38
  Speaker 1: have to be prepared to fight. And like and like
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 1: he's he's very very progressive because he's like, yeah, like
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 1: women are people too, and so he like he goes
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 1: to like feminist lectures and shit, like it's even noted
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: upon because like the boys do like girls jobs as
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: well as girls doing boys jobs. Which is something my
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 1: Papa instilled on me, like he made us all do it.
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 1: So like I can just about not very well, but
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 1: I can. I can chop logs for the fire. I can.
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 1: I can basically start a fire anywhere. It's a skill
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 1: that my papa, Papa trained, like all his kids could
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 1: do it. So like my brothers had to learn how
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 1: to sew. They don't do it very well. I'd do
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 1: it better. I would be a great nineteen fifties housewife
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: if if they give me the drugs, darling. But also
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 1: like I can sew, I can embroider, I can darn.
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 1: I know those are three different types of sowing. But
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: like I can just about, like I can do enough,
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 1: you know, I can weave. I can weave, like I
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 1: can cook when I want to. But like my brothers
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 1: can do very manly things. But also like we were
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 1: all taught to do like all the jobs, because you
• 1:17:59
  Speaker 1: have to be able to do everything. Like my boys,
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 1: my boys, my boys, no, my brothers both learned how
• 1:18:07
  Speaker 1: to cook because my mom was like, you're gonna have to.
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 1: But yeah, anything that was severely heavy I wouldn't do
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: because I'm the baby. Anyway, everybody does everything and so
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 1: like it's noted upon like in this house specifically that
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 1: the boys are like washing dishes and shit, and they're like,
• 1:18:30
  Speaker 1: what is this. The girls are in the garden digging
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 1: and the boys and washing dishes because like everybody did
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: every job because it's like, you know, you'll live here.
• 1:18:42
  Speaker 1: And so he was very much like equal equal rights. However,
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 1: he was distrustful of other white people. So he was
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 1: a labor reformer. But he believed that you know, companies
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 1: were trying to like cheat farmers out of their share
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 1: of profits, and by companies rich white people, rich white
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: people like you know, the working class besties, no worries,
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 1: but you know the corporations, the big business no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: not feeling that at all. And so yeah, John resented
• 1:19:32
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna call them exploitative, the exploitative businessmen. And he
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 1: was just not really keen on capitalism. And like this
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 1: is why he probably wasn't a great businessman because he
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 1: refused to play the games all that, Like he wasn't
• 1:19:50
  Speaker 1: you know, supply and demand, like he wasn't messing about
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 1: just because oh you know there's less of this, I'm
• 1:19:55
  Speaker 1: gonna charge more and so with regards to his business,
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 1: like he's like part of the Perkinsville business. They end
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 1: up separating in eighteen fifty four. So later that year,
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 1: there's a black man in Boston, Anthony Bunns, and he
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 1: was being held by authorities because a Virginia farmer failed
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 1: a request to reclaim him as a slave. Now John
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 1: hears about this, like he's in New York at the time,
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 1: and he's like, what is this? Fuck this for Game
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 1: of Soldiers. And so he stands up in his chair
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 1: and he says, Anthony Burns must be released or I
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 1: will die in the tempt. The man is intense. Okay,
• 1:20:45
  Speaker 1: this is blonde espresso intense. You know, I can't remember
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 1: names of coffee. You're just gonna have to suffer through it.
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 1: And so yeah, he declared he was going to Boston,
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 1: and his friend is like, don't do that, like you're
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 1: trying to deal with a lawsuit right now, because you
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 1: know you're in debt again and so so, so he
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 1: didn't quite get to do that. The man is intense
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 1: and dramatic, and he didn't quite yet. So anyway, that
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 1: same year, the Kansas Nebraska Actors passed and this meant
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 1: that the newly settled territories had the power to decide
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 1: whether they were free states or slave states. And this
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 1: just made John angrier, and so Frederick Douglas ends up
• 1:21:36
  Speaker 1: publishing a letter written by John and legislators in which
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 1: he goes, legislators, sorry, fiends in human shape who pass
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 1: abominably wicked and unjust laws. And so John just gets angrier,
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 1: and now he wants to attack Harper's Ferry, and like
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: what is now West Virginia, And so Harper's Ferry, the
• 1:22:04
  Speaker 1: reason he chooses it is because it housed a federal
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 1: arsenal that produced a large number of weapons for the
• 1:22:12
  Speaker 1: US military. You know, the thing he hates. Do you
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 1: remember from the beginning of this episode when he said
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 1: he fucking hates the military. Here he is, And so
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 1: this attack was supposed to be symbolic of his opposition
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 1: to a national government that condoned and supported slavery, and
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 1: so it was really important, like years later when the
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: Civil War happens, that the Confederacy in the Union, they
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 1: just like fight over it thirteen times. But Harper's Ferry,
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 1: that was a plan he wasn't really going to be
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: able to do just yet because it involved men, money,
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 1: and just a lot of planning. And so instead he
• 1:22:55
  Speaker 1: decided to head to Kansas, which was m I mean,
• 1:23:03
  Speaker 1: I mean the gravitational pool of you know, slavery related conflict. Yeah,
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 1: sucks him in. So Kansas had voted to be a
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 1: slave state. However, there was evidence, and when I say evidence,
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 1: I mean a fuck ton of evidence suggesting that there
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 1: was voter fraud going on in order to force a
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 1: pro slave result. And yeah, that dragged John Brown into
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 1: the fray. But that is going to have to wait
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: for next time. And so I'm gonna bid you farewell
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 1: for now and we'll catch up on the next episode
• 1:23:50
  Speaker 1: sooner than you think. Arios au Revoir of Where Is There?
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 1: My Friends? Bye Bye,