19th block - Birds in the Air

from Barbara Brackman's Underground Railroad quilt

"After years of war, the end seemed tantalizingly near in 1864. Edward Taylor told WPA interviewers his perspective as a slave: " I used to hear the white folks reading the paper about the war and reading the Yankees beat them, and I wondered what in the world is Yankees. I thought they were talking about the birds of the air or something."

Facts & Fabrications ~ Unraveling the History of Quilts & Slavery by Barbara Brackman

14th block - Trip Around the World

from Barbara Brackman's Underground Railroad quilt

"One step in the process toward emancipation was a national movement called Colonization, which developed early in the nineteenth century. Many people believed freed and escaped slaves should move to Canada, which had eliminated slavery with a program of gradual emancipation. Another idea, popular for a while, was a back to Africa movement."

Facts & Fabrications ~ Unraveling the History of Quilts & Slavery by Barbara Brackman

13th block - Underground Railroad

from Barbara Brackman's Underground Railroad quilt,

"Escapees were often hungry, lost, and terrified on their lonely trips North. In the 1830s, an organized network of help developed. Members of the movement known as the Underground Railroad offered assistance to runaways in the way to shelter, food, clothing, jobs, and transport to another station closer to freedom. At first, assistance came mainly from Quakers. As time went on, however, more white people, motivated by religious and moral beliefs, joined the Quakers and free and escaped blacks in helping fugitives."

Facts & Fabrications ~ Unraveling the History of Quilts & Slavery by Barbara Brackman