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FREDERICK DOUGLASS: 'The Voice of Freedom'// February 7, 1817 -- February 20, 1895; AMERICAN HEROES

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From: Lancaster New Era Lancaster, PA
Date: 20020226
Author:Lorraine Roscoe; Special to the New Era; Dennis Denenberg

RIGHT NOW, you're doing what for Frederick Douglass was an illegal activity that enabled him to become a free man. You are reading.

It was against the law to teach a slave to read and write. If a slave could read, the slave might start to think about ideas like freedom, justice, and fairness. That sounded like trouble to slave owners. But Mrs. Auld didn't know the law when eight-year-old Frederick was given to her family.

Frederick had lots of chores to do in the house, but life at the Auld home in Baltimore was better than he'd ever known -- his owner actually taught him to read.

Then Mrs. ...

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