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Introducing African-American Passages: Black Lives in the 19th Century

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During his time as a Distinguished Visiting Scholar here at the John W. Kluge Center, Georgetown University history professor Adam Rothman recorded an extraordinary series of podcasts. In the podcasts, Rothman examines documents from the Library of Congress’ manuscript collection relating to the lives of African-Americans in the 19th century. He found a number of fascinating stories there.

In this first episode, Rothman introduces the concept of the podcast series and previews the stories he tells in greater depth in upcoming episodes. Be sure to check back each Wednesday in February to hear the stories of Omar Ibn Said, Robert Pinn, and Adeline Henson.

You can read Rothman’s other recent work on these topics: Here’s him writing about a letter from an enslaved man to his owner, former President James K. Polk. And here he is on the experience of transcribing documents from the exceptional Omar Ibn Said collection.

The Kluge Center will also be hosting an event on February 21 at 4:00 pm, featuring Rothman in conversation with Jesse J. Holland, award winning journalist, novelist, and author of “The Invisibles: The Untold Story of African American Slaves in the White House,” on the subject of African-American lives in the 19th century.

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