Presented by Michelle Arnosky Sherburne
Saturday, September 21 at 2:00 p.m.
New Ipswich Library (6 Main Street)
Vermont historian, author, and newspaper publisher, Michelle Arnosky Sherburne will delve into New Hampshire’s fascinating hidden history of abolition, slavery, and Underground Railroad networks, highlighting the work of abolitionists to move freedom seekers northward to safety in Canada.
Despite the fact that Portsmouth served as a slave-trade hub for New England, 19th- century NH historians chose to exclude black heritage and history from their publications. In recent decades researchers like Sherburne have uncovered the rich history and significant contributions of enslaved people and discovered that the Underground Railroad network was active throughout the Granite State. With connections to Massachusetts’ abolitionists, such as William Lloyd Garrison, Nathaniel Peabody Rogers and Stephen Symonds Foster, freedom seekers were certainly prevalent in New Hampshire.
Sherburne will share what she has learned from her extensive research over the past 30 years.
A resident of Newbury, VT, Michelle Arnosky Sherburne has spent four decades in the newspaper business. In 2022, she and her husband took over the stewardship of the Journal Opinion, a weekly publication in Bradford, VT. Sherburne’s longstanding interest in the Civil War inspired her research of Vermont and New Hampshire’s Underground Railroad and the Abolitionist Movement, which has led to TV appearances, consultancies, in-school residencies, and the publication of four books and numerous articles. With a history project always in progress, Sherburne enjoys traveling around Vermont and New Hampshire lecturing and sharing her insights into New England’s rich history.
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