Raising the Dead: Coming to the Table
I did not realize until I was an adult that my ancestors were enslaved. I was born in Chicago in a time greatly influenced by the Civil Rights Movement that was sparked by the lynching of Emmitt Till in 1954 and the refusal of Rosa Parks in 1955 to give up her seat on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama, where my father was born. My family never talked about slavery, and although we read about the Civil War and Emancipation in school books, I never connected the concept to me personally.
To read the rest of this article, go to: Raising the Dead, by Sharon Leslie Morgan for National Genealogical Society magazine, Volume 42, Number 2.
To read Lucia King’s related article from the previous issue of NGS magazine, go to: Truth Hurts, Then Heals.