Connie Martin begins this presentation by telling the history of her family who were slaves captured in West Africa and survived the Middle Passage. She tells her family’s stories of secrecy, codes, and fugitive slave escape routes from South to North, which was revealed in an information-packed family Bible found dated 1865.

Connie also tells the origin of the Underground Railroad, and reveals key famous abolitionists, slave routes passing through our counties in Illinois, and shows the quilt code on slides and fabric quilt pattern, along with instances of special stitching used in over a dozen beautifully hand-crafted quilt replicas each sewn by Connie’s mother especially for this presentation.

Spaces are limited and are first come, first served.

This program is brought to you as part of the Illinois Humanities Road Scholars grant.

Please register for this event. Once you register you will receive a confirmation email with a link to the Zoom meeting, a phone number to call into the Zoom meeting, and a password to the meeting. Join the Zoom meeting 5 minutes prior to the program, especially if you haven’t used Zoom before.

Illinois Humanities is supported in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the Illinois General Assembly [through the Illinois Arts Council Agency (IACA)], as well as by contributions from individuals, foundations and corporations.

Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed by speakers, program participants, or audiences do not necessarily reflect those of the NEH, Illinois Humanities, IACA, our partnering organizations, or our funders.

For more information or to register, please contact Britta at brittak@dkpl.org or (815) 756-9568 ext. 2100.

We apologize, but this program is full. Please check out our event calendar for our other wonderful programs.