[applause] good evening. Thanks for coming on on what was a nice day today. Welcome to the lecture on Harriet Tubman. You probably know we are in a Harriet Tubman revival right now. A new appreciation of an iconic figure. It is a name we relate with the underground railroad. We sort of forget that after the underground railroad, Harriet Tubman lived for another 50 years. Some remarkable 50 years after the civil war. Tonights speaker is here to bring us up to speed and uptodate on that in our lecture. [applause] as you probably know, Harriet Tubmans face is due to grace the front of the 20 bill soon. Our speaker, Catherine Clinton, [applause] Catherine Clinton is one of the people that helped to put her there. In fact, her biography of Harriet Tubman was praised as a revelation. Not bad. Harriet tubman is probably an appropriate subject for her. I will tell you a little bit about catherine. She has been in perpetual motion almost her entire life as well. She grew up in kansas city, missouri. She received her undergraduate from harvard university, followed by a phd from princeton. She specializes in American History with an emphasis on the American South and the civil war, as well as american women and african American History. She has held academic positions at countless institutions. She has been at the university fritchman, the citadel, she is currently the chair of history at university of texas at san antonio. Let me also add this to her list of accomplishments. She served as a consulting scholar on a number of documentaries and feature films, including Steven Spielbergs lincoln. Pretty neat. Finally, she has also recently written a wellreceived Childrens Book about Harriet Tubman which she will be signing after the lecture along with her other work. Please help me welcome Catherine Clinton. [applause] thank you so much. Many thanks for this return to fredericksburg. I am particularly heartened that both the lecture series and my biography of Harriet Tubman got launched in the same year. I think it is a testament to the welltold story of a life. Im also pleased that since 2004, there have been more than half a dozen excellent studies on tubman and the underground railroad including the , pulitzerprizewinning recent book, gateway to freedom. It was a New York Times bestseller which i think shows , there is a real hunger being slaked about our new views about the underground railroad. During the intervening years, the university of Mary Washington has supported the plutarch award. It is given annually by the Biographers International organization. So i think it is a great time to , be celebrating great lives. The remarkable accomplishments of Harriet Tubman as an intrepid conductor on the underground railroad were widely acknowledged at the dawn of this century. But what of her role in the American Civil War and the postwar reforms she supported during those many years . Womens suffrage, black civil rights, africanamerican philanthropy. What of her patriotism and persistence . My book stemmed from a conviction that scholarly works were in short supply. There was one authorized work in 1869, just after the civil war. And then another by earl conrad which was published in the middle of world war ii. When i was invited to write an encyclopedia entry on tubman when i was teaching at harvard, i discovered there was only a handful of scholarly articles. And it was 60 years since there had been a trade biography of her. And so, tubman languished , confined to the childrens shelf. There are over 300 tubman books listed on amazon, including my own childrens picture book. I kept getting invited to read manuscripts. So i thought it was easier to , just do my own Childrens Book. So i wrote a childs book published in 2007. My road to Harriet Tubman coincided with important changes in interpretations of emancipation and in womens contribution to our past. When i began my doctoral degree in American History during the celebration of the u. S. Bicentennial, it was an uphill climb. I had majored in american studies. For my masters, i had done African American studies as an undergraduate. But i was an ardent feminist and i wanted to see women included in the landscape of American History. The reading list for my doctoral qualifying exams included the foundational text, the age of jackson. It remained a standard on graduate reading lists well into the 1990s. Little did i imagine that the age of jackson might give way to a new era of tubman within my own lifetime. My princeton mentor was a pioneer. Many of you might know his battle cry of freedom. One of the most successful civil war texts. But he was a pioneer in african American History. He published a pathbreaking collection in 1965 entitled the negro civil war. So, the revolution was underway to showcase African American contributions to the battle to end slavery and the consequent freedom struggles for equal opportunity which continue. Now, womens history had not yet cracked the graduate curriculum by 1976. But the double burden of trying to expand the horizons of social history and tell stories from the bottom up was a great challenge. My generation of feminist historians felt we had our work cut out for us. In narratives which did mention tubman, she was always heralded as an underground railroad contributor. This was always foregrounded. And i think this remarkable story deserves our attention. But she made significant attributions as a scout, a spy for the union. She was a nurse, and she really was working closely with the military behind enemy lines. After 1865, she had a strong record of agitating for womens suffrage while establishing her charity home in her adopted home of auburn in upstate new york. When she opened this home, it was the only charity home open to African Americans in all of new york outside of manhattan. Yet the more than halfcentury following the abolition of slavery until her death in 1913 remains a relatively neglected. Period of her life. By the time my Harriet Tubman appeared in 2004, scholars seemed ready to include her in the framework of african freedom struggles, to place her alongside other icons. Tubmans image has adorned dozens of book covers, logos, websites. She has a symbolic utility for many academic audiences. The twofer of being both a black and a woman. The academy seemed ready to embrace her as a longlost history who had been there all along. Just as she managed such a brilliant career hidden in plain , sight. So she has had a remarkable , historical comeback within the last few years which i will return to later. There are many controversial aspects of her life. And particularly her legacy. One dispute has arisen between biographers over the date of her birth. I ascribe her birth year is the toas the one she testified on multiple government pensions. While others suggested alternate dates, tubman would have never lied about her age. As a subject of my most recent biography, first lady mary lincoln, was wont to do. We know that Harriet Tubman appeared in the 1820s. I suggest that she was born in 1825 to enslaved parents on the maryland Eastern Shore. During childhood, she was severely challenged. Tubman later lamented i grew up like a no neglected weed, ignorant of liberty, having no experience of it. She led a harsh life, being put out to work at the age of six. Moving from household to plantation, to a neighbors farm, being harassed by overseers. Witnessing siblings disappearing. While growing into a young woman, she preferred labor in the fields rather than the smothering supervision of domestic house service. She married a free black man named tubman, but lived where her master saw fit. In 1849, when she heard a rumor that her owner was planning to sell her down the river, many family and neighbors had already been exiled into the deep south. So, she decided to make an escape. She wanted to make her own journey to freedom. In doing so, she was leaving behind parents and siblings. She would assume her mothers name, taking the freedom name of harriet, which was also the name of one of her sisters who disappeared. But she would try to convince her husband to go with her, but he was not convinced. But she took his name, tubman, with her. The documentation of her departure, the infamous runaway advertisement, had never been located. In 1997, a maryland native moved his family to bucktown, maryland , to settle on property is slaveowning ancestors had once lived on. He hoped to create a tourist site at the refurbished Uptown Village store to protect and restore local heritage. This store was the place where a young Harriet Tubman once ran ahead to warn a slave that the overseer was pursuing him. When harriet came between the enraged overseer and the playing fleeing slave she was felled , by an iron weight he had thrown. The store is one of relatively few documented sites from harriets years in maryland. In early 2003, meredith heard that the heirs of a family that lived for generations on the Eastern Shore were filling up a dumpster. He asked if he might take a look at what was being thrown out. Granted permission, he and his wife put on the rubber gloves, donned the old clothes, and dug in. To their amazement, they unearthed a copy of the cambridge democrat, containing an advertisement for the runaway. The First Published piece of evidence documenting her flight and something that has always eluded scholars and archivists. I wont say never pass up a dumpster, but it is sometimes tempting. As a liberated woman, tubman arrived in pennsylvania, and she launched an illustrious career as a member of the underground railroad. By all rights in legend and deed, Harriet Tubman was the great emancipator, leading scores of African Americans to freedom in the north, at times all the way to canada. Scholars may disagree over the numbers she led to freedom, but numbers she led to freedom, but we all agree that she sacrificed comfort and safety to liberate others. She worked in concert with black abolitionist William Still of philadelphia and white Quaker Thomas Garrett of delaware. She often told the story of the dark of night when three companions moved soundlessly along a deserted turnpike. The two male figures who accompanied tubman had never been on the road before, the path to freedom. More than the autumn chill in the air caused them to shiver as they moved as quickly and silently as possible, hoping to reach their next stop before dawn. If cloudy skies obscured the moon, their guide was able to direct them. Despite dangers and risks, the men were glad for their good fortune because they entrusted their fate to moses, as she was known among her people. During this moonlit trek tubman , decided to move off the highway and across an open field. The field ran out and she faced an unfamiliar river. She walked along the banks to see if there might be a bridge or a boat to get to the other side. After a fruitless search fearing sunrise might overtake them, tubman insisted they would have to cross on foot. The two men refused, fearing drowning more than the slaveholders lash. Rather than draw her pistol or waste her breath, she waded across alone. After she made it to the other side, the two men followed. Soaked and weary, they had to forge another stream before they came to an isolated cabin where they could take shelter. They made it to freedom a few days later. It was incredibly dangerous to assist fugitives on the road. Suspects were thrown in jail with the flimsiest of evidence. Samuel green, a free black minister in dorchester county, tubmans home county, was investigated by authorities. He was suspected of having harvard having harbored a group involved in a mass escape in the summer of 1857. His home was searched by the local constable, but yielded no incriminating evidence except a copy of uncle toms cabin. Now, under maryland law, possession of this by an African American was illegal. It was a banned book. Green was prosecuted, convicted, and because of his high profile within the community, he was given a harsh sentence of 10 years in jail. This punishment was meant to send a message to those who would dare harbor fugitives. They would be prosecuted and there would be no mercy. Tubman crafted her expeditions with extreme care. The white abolitionist reported that the woman known as moses would use music and spirituals to signal to fugitives hidden along the road. She directed them by her songs as to whether they could show themselves or must continue to lie low. No one would notice what was sung by an old colored woman as she trudged along the road. Once when tubman had to pass through a town near her maryland home during daylight, she walked the streets with a large sunbonnet over her face and two live fowl. When she spotted one of her former masters approaching, she made the chickens flap and she avoided eye contact and tended to her birds and passed inches from this former master. Her steel nerves and her ingenuity combined to make her one of the most intrepid workers within the underground railroad. Harriet was nearly always prepared with a change of costume or other diversion. With great pride, she confided to her suffer just suffer just colleagues in 1904, i can say what most conductors cannot say, i never ran my train off the track and i never lost the passenger. There were only a handful of conductors who gained notoriety before harriet came onto the scene. All of them were white men and most of them were known as abductors who traveled into the south to assist fugitives. A specialized and dangerous business. The reason these white men became identified as abductors or conductors is because they were caught, which in all but one case curtailed their underground railroad activities. In 1844, a massachusetts sea captain, jonathan walker, was detained offshore in florida with a boatload of fugitives. Walker was caught in the act of assisting runaways as he used the open seas as his escape route. Convicted by a pensacola jury, walker was at first walked into a pillory where he was pelted with rotten eggs. Then he was given excessive fines and forced to serve a year in jail before antislavery friends could raise enough cash to secure his release. But before he was released and sent on his way, he received a punishment which would become infamous. He was branded on the hand by a u. S. Marshall with the mark ss for slave stealer. A term white southerners used as an epithet. Green composed a hymn in tribute which ended with the verse, then let that manley righthand bold. Expanded palm shall prophecy salvation for the slaves. He was there all along the road to freedom with Harriet Tubman as were others. Good thesis topics for you students out there. Fairfield was the most unusual of the three, born the son of a slaveholder but renounced his birthright to spend his time and energy liberating slaves, assisting them all the way to canada. Charles torrey was a yaleeducated minister who resigned his post at a church in providence in 1838 to become involved in the underground railroad. He was caught transporting a slave family out of virginia in 1843. He was sentenced to six years energy liberating slaves, hard labor in the maryland penitentiary. He died while incarcerated and became a martyr to the cause. Equally infamous, the reverend Calvin Fairbanks learned to hate slavery when he was a student at Oberlin College in ohio. By 1837, he began making trips into kentucky to transport slaves to freedom helping them across the ohio river. Over his years with the underground railroad, he smuggled nearly 50 slaves to freedom. He began with a 15yearold girl who the Ohio Underground Railroad conductor adopted into his family. Fairbanks spirited the girl away from her 80yearold master in montgomery county, kentucky. She was the fifth in direct descent from her master, being the great, great, great granddaughter of a slave whom he took as his mistress at the age of 14. And now, he was expecting to make this girl his mistress. This kind of sensationalism became standard abolitionist fare, unveiling the evils of slavery. As was this anonymous painting in 1850 slave sale in lexington, kentucky. John brown always called Harriet Tubman, general, that signaled his highest esteem for her and that she was a warrior. In the wake of john browns death and martyrdom, tubman participated in her public first rescue in upstate new york. In 1860, charles, a fugitive slave, was being held by authorities in troy, new york. Tubman was visiting a troy relative when his fate was being determined in a courtroom. She took pops into the crowded chamber that made her look very innocuous. Tubman was standing at the back of the room when it was announced that he would be shipped back to virginia. The crowd below, disappointed in the verdict, began to swell. Harriet tubman knew she must seize the moment. She would test the good people of troy. Would they rise to the occasion . And help her strike a blow for freedom . Shortly after, he was manacled, tubman maneuvered herself into position to take action. In the blink of an eye, the frail old woman surprised the guard by wrenching him free and dragging him down the stairs into the waiting arms of comrades. An eyewitness reported she was repeatedly beaten over the head with policemens clubs but she never released her hold. Bleeding and half conscious, he was hauled down to the river and brought across the river on a skip. However authorities on the , opposite bank were laying in wait. Once he reached the other side, he was taken back into custody and confined to a judges chamber. His boat was followed by a ferry with 400 abolitionists bent on protecting him. Tubman rallied followers to storm the building where he was being held. Bent on liberation, the human battering ram wreaked havoc. Harriet and other colored women brought him out and put him into the first wagon passing and started him for the west. The troy times described those sheuded had bested included lawyers, editors, public man, private individuals have all been rescued. The rankandfile were black. African fury is entitled to claim the greatest share in the rescue. Tubman had earned the name of moses on the underground railroad, but was also a joshua as well. She later recalled during his rescue, the shot was flying like hail above her head. Tubman knew what most americans with soon discover, what john brown had tried to demonstrate a few months before, slavery was war. So tubman symbolizes the most , powerful and purest elements of the underground railroad. Righteous selfdetermination, defeat of unjust laws through collective resistance. During her career, she risked her own life and freedom again and again. Making daring rescues to liberate others. All of this was undertaken while she suffered a severe disability. What she and friends referred to as losing time. As there are no records, we can only speculate on her medical condition. Perhaps she suffered from narcolepsy. Some suggest she could have had temporal lobe epilepsy. But whatever her disease, she faced it with courage. Without complaint, a hallmark of her career. After the civil war was formally declared, moving her underground struggles above ground, Harriet Tubman joined the federal forces first in virginia and then in south carolina. She was the plotter behind one of the most daring union raids deep in the heart of dixie. Cumby river raid. On june 2, 1863, 3 federal ships moved cautiously up river shortly before midnight loaded with 150 black soldiers from the second south carolina. The band of soldiers knew that on this mission their fate , rested not just in the hands of their commander but also entrusted to the famous moses. And here is a picture of colonel montgomery having a bad hair day, quite clearly. [laughter] but he was a ferocious soldier. And they followed him proudly. A sneak attack in the dead of night to catch slaveholders off guard in their own backyards was vintage tubman. Along south carolinas river, tubman had been given the location of rebel torpedoes which were stationary mines placed below the surface of the water. They did not move. She guided union ships to avoid them. On this dangerous journey, she was liberating more than the handfuls at a time that she freed during the underground railroad days. On the lookout, tubman guided the boats to designated spots on the shore where fugitives lay hidden. Once the all clear was given, they would approach the water line to be loaded onto ships. And cast their lots with mr. Lincolns army. Over 750 slaves were put on to the Union Gunboats that night. Tubmans plan was triumphant. The official confederate report concluded, the enemy seems to have been well posted as to the character and capacity of our troops. And there is small chance of encountering opposition. And to have been well guided by persons thoroughly acquainted with the river and country. After the river raid, critics north and south could no longer pretend blacks were unfit as this was a wellexecuted military operation which was celebrated in northern papers. Tubman continued her struggle working as a spy and a scout for union generals. Following her retirement from the army in 1865, tubman returned to her home in the Finger Lakes Region of upstate new york where she settled into the role of activist and philanthropist. She solicited funds for veterans and womens benefits. She remained active in womens suffrage and other important reform crusades. She sought compensation from the government, petitioning it for back wages and then for a soldiers pension. This campaign took her over 30 years. At first, tubman received a monthly stipend of 8 a month for widows. She had remarried Union Veteran nelson davis in 1869. He died in 1888. After a series of petitions, in 1899, she was granted 20 per month. Not the full pension of a soldier, but more than the pension of a nurse. In recognition of her war work. Tubman died on march 10, 1913. In the Harriet Tubman home, a Charitable Institution she had established to shelter and care for the needy within her community. Following her death, booker t. Washington and other race leaders praised tubman for her exemplary sacrifice and contribution. She was given a military funeral at Fort Hill Cemetery in auburn, new york. The town of auburn also put up a plaque in her memory on the courthouse to commemorate her. And this was the first public acknowledgment of an African American woman through this memorialization. I have been to the commemoration of tubmans life during the annual ceremony in auburn, new york, on tubman day, march 10. Ive been to Saint Catherines canada where she shepherded her fugitives to safety to avoid slave catchers in the north. Ive been to the renovated i have been to the renovated Country Store in maryland, near where she received her lifethreatening injury. I have sailed on the waters by cambridge, maryland, where tubman wrote as a child. I have been to boston where she spoke to, quote, colored conventions on behalf of freedom. On my travels i have bought , tubman mugs, stamps, even a comic book. But you need not leave home to receive treasures. Search on the internet and the popular ebay. It will yield you a grab bag of tubman memorabilia. Ceramic figures posters, and , especially dolls. Dolls to the tubman American Heritage doll all have one thing in common. Their lack of resemblance to tubman. I was taken aback when a senior scholar endorsed my idea that hes adjusted i needed to remind people that harriets first language was dutch. He was mixing her up with Sojourner Truth. When i told another scholar, a mentor, actually, that i would be writing a biography of the most famous africanamerican from the 19th century, he only guessed tubman on the third try. Starting with Frederick Douglass , who we know is making a comeback. [laughter] guessed toussaint louverture. I only include these anecdotes to illustrate that graduates were more familiar with tubmans those in thethan formal academy. In the 1980s and 1990s, discussions on electronic lists and letters to the editor tried to use tubman as an advocate for gun rights versus gun control. She not only used a rifle, but we know she always carried a pistol during her travels along the underground railroad. This matter of fact should not really influence modern political debate, but it seems to. It was to my great regret i each to harriet and i took tubman plays, but they were quite different plays. The issue of guns and schools, guns and children, had become much more highly charged in the 1980s. And i was also interested in the idea that was propagated in popular art, such as this print, that Harriet Tubman carried a rifle when she was on the underground railroad. Now she was so stealthy, so , wise, that i think a black woman carrying a rifle around, in the south, behind enemy lines, is not really likely. But she did carry a pistol, and these of that pistol and the fact that she carried a gun is something that, as i have said, has been dragged into a lot of modern debates. Certainly the black Power Movement of the 1960s created a renewed wave of interest in tubman, portraying her as a founding mother of black revolutionaries. And as i have taught abroad for the last decade, the image of her was really popularized internationally. At the victoria and Albert Museum in london, they had an installation for the bicentennial celebration of the ending of the International Slave trade, and there she was, in some ways, treated as a mama of revolutionaries. Tubman may have been a revolutionary and advocated by many any means necessary, but she was also one of the women, who sought to build through interracial cooperation, and she put her Christian Faith into action. Thus, she has become, in a way, a harriet for all seasons, embraced by the black panthers on the one hand, by clandestine , modern movements to shelter women and children in the modern era, and certainly, advocates of peaceful nonviolence. In such a pinnacle of convicted symbolism, her popularity elicited some kind of backlash following the National History standards. Tubmans name was invoked as an example of laws associated with the guidelines. Whereprotracted abates, proponents of the standards hammered away at the laws tubman , became a hotbed for critics. She became a whipping girl for political correctness. But even as pundits bickered she , continued to blossom with an pop culture. Artistic representations of harriet are manifold. One of my favorite remains some of these images of harriet done by Jacob Lawrence in his famous series. Public art is impressive and a measure of her growing presence, especially in statues. A tribute to her partnership was erected in delaware, erected in 1993. A Group Portrait in battlefield, michigan in 1994. And by the way, battlefield, michigan was Sojourner Truths home. Africanamericans to freedom in boston in tubman 1989. With a child in little rock. Tubman exhorting in bristol, pennsylvania, a 2006 statue. And tubman in manhattan in 2008, on the corner of Saint Nicholas and Frederick Douglass avenue. There is a bust outside the sailor them chapel in canada that was set up in 2010. And the markers there are much too many markers for me to keep track of, but it was a particular triumph when south overina named the bridge toe comby river in tubmans honor in 2008. Despite a powerful portrayal of tubman in a miniseries in 2008, she has had a very low profile. Until recently, viola davis is trying to bring her to the screen for a movie. When she won the emmy award in 2015, she paraphrased tubmans words to advocate on behalf of black actresses. In my mind, i see a line. And over that line, i see green fields and lovely flowers, and beautiful white women with their arms stretched out to me over that line. But i cannot seem to get there nowhow. I cannot seem to get over that line. Davis would go on to say that that was tubman in the 1800s. And let me tell you something the only thing that separates women of color from anyone else is opportunity. In march, 2017, tubman will appear as a regular on the wgn series underground. For those of you watching it. Although, sadly, i have not seen the new series, but the promos do show harriet carrying a rifle, rather than a pistol. [laughter] mercy street has many more historians consulting on it. But although she was featured in the 2012ic leet Abraham Lincoln vampire hunter, and i have to say, i have a special weakness for this, although my friend with quite rightly outraged that this movie would be the first movie to portray lincoln in over 60 years, rather than spielbergs lincoln. But nevertheless, it has a plot twist where the first lady, mary lincoln and Harriet Tubman, come together to save the day by smuggling Silver Bullet to gettysburg so federal soldiers could defeat the vampire confederates. [laughter] i could not have imagined this. But when i did see it, it had a certain kind of symmetry, for me. So tubman has really remained folkloric, and she has only recently been given the respect she deserves. Here is a portrait of her as an old woman. And she is wearing a shawl, you see. It is not the shawl on display, where you can go to the new african American History and Culture Museum in d. C. And see a shawl sent it is to her by queen victoria. To see that, at long last, we are discovering other aspects. When the womens in the 1920s campaign emerged online in the spring of 2015, it was a popular internet uprising. It followed in the wake of u. S. Treasurer and obama appointee, rosie rios, who advocated for putting women on money. First with secretary tim geithner, and then secretary jacob lew. Was a scheduling of redesign for bills, and she felt it was time for us to consider putting women on the money. The Internet Campaign raised important issues, including a poll, with over 600,000 voting, and Harriet Tubman was declared the winner. In the summer of 2015, when the treasury launched its own new 10 campaign, i pronounced tubman a fine candidate, and weighed in like many other scholars. But the populist outpouring was unprecedented, as the treasury website received over one million americans sending in their nominees. And this became, in many ways, a campaign to educate people about women in American History. Was not think that it interrupted somewhat by the save Hamilton Campaign of the same period. And i also think we cannot really judge how successful it was, because, unfortunately, educating the American People on women can be an uphill battle. As the gop candidates were faced with this, who would they know might, they found the next day, most of the newspapers gave them a very poor grading for their nominations. Nevertheless, over the summer of 2015, i became concerned about all the competing agendas. And on august 5, 2015, the secretary of the treasury invited a group of scholars to the smithsonian to discuss ongoing efforts to put a female face on american currency. Now this is actually the back of a 2 bill. How many of you actually remember the 2 bill . Oh, we have some hands. Would surprise you to know that would it surprise you to know that is Thomas Jefferson on the front of the 2 bill. I think it came out in a flurry. It was often used by africanamericans during black History Month to demonstrate their consumer power, so you would actually find it circulating more as a protest rather than a populist movement. So i think secretary lou sec retary lew and treasurer rosie rios wanted to get a crosssection. They had a kind of summit meeting. Here is a picture with rosie rios on august 5, 2015. They gathered scholars from history, economics, anthropology, with specialties ranging from america in the late 20th century to colonial history. Is during our lively debates that a woman of color must be the female honored on any redesigedn currency. Redesigned currency. I was not alone in this conviction. Nor, the only one who advocated tubman that she would fit along the bill. But i was the only scholar who brought along my biographies for the secretary and the treasurer so they can learn for themselves why tubman would be such an unimpeachable candidate. I later met with lew privately after he read my book and requested to meet with me privately. In my recently published book, stepdaughters of history, i argue that dismantling the mammy is a necessary step for including africanamerican women in American History, particularly women like Harriet Tubman. And i discussed the issues that arose during a very Heated Exchange at the smithsonian summit. Some of us objected to the idea that womens faces must be treated to a higher aesthetic standard, rather than judging the individuals worth by contributions to american ideals. This is something i thought was done with men and thought should be equally done with women. Most upsetting for me was a comment by a scholar that the American People may not be able mammy on the money, even if it was a beloved icon, like Harriet Tubman. So i then pulled out a copy of my book. With a dignified image of the hero. And you can look at the three biographies that came out in 2004 we all use the same image. We argued passionately for her selection. And there it was. Harriet tubman, even after escaping, achieving, forces of eurasia erasure, that she could be branded a mammy. However, she is part of a generation of new African American scholarship that included disremembering alongside omitting. She would be part of our revised narrative that allowed flesh and blood of women as fleshy and bloody as necessary to replace cartoon characters. Tubmans story remains emblematic of africanamerican womans struggles in the 19th century into the modern era. Mammyas and is proof remains a weapon in our culture. Argued0, 2016, jacob lew the family of redesign bills would maintain hamilton while providing opportunities for more than just one woman. Thus lucretia mott, susan b. , anthony, Elizabeth Cady stanton, and Sojourner Truth will appear on the back of the 10 bill. The first one to be redesign. And marian anderson, eleanor roosevelt, joined by Martin Luther king, are proposed for the reverse of the lincoln 5 portrait. But it will be harriet alone that will adorn the front of a new 20 bill, dislodging andrew jackson. It was a victory many associated with this campaign. But getting Harriet Tubman on the money was my goal. All of these redesigns will be glacierly slow. But when i began my career over 40 years ago, the idea that such a change would happen within my lifetime seemed a fantasy. I did hope to survive to see the opening of a Harriet Tubman underground Railroad Monument on the Eastern Shore of maryland. And it will happen this year, 2017, on the weekend of march 11, which follows Harriet Tubman day. This is an effort spearheaded by independent scholar and tubman biographer kate larson. I also very much welcome the addition of the Harriet TubmanNational Historic park in auburn, new york. On the side of the charity home in january, 2017. It is especially gratifying to be able to give three cheers over a newly discovered portrait of tubman. What experts agree is perhaps the earliest known photograph of her. Be auctioned off at swann galleries in manhattan on the 30th of march. The portrait was not discovered in a dumpster, but in a jumble sale on the streets of new york when someone strolled by and started picking through the pictures. I know some of you out there do that. I know you are looking for treasure. Ago, this30 years carte duvis. M of those of us addicted to searching for valuables should share in this celebration of a treasure finally coming to light. This is a newly discovered portrait of Harriet Tubman. 2016 was a banner year, as we also have miss liberty getting a new face. It has been announced by the u. S. Mint. And we, of course, eagerly await tubman on the 20 bill. Writing my biography of tubman last century, i adopted the mantra, let 100 harriets bloom. And sure enough, the u. S. Treasury will make this dream a reality when we can and joy billions of tubmans joining lincoln in circulation. So lets give harriet a cheer in the new year. [applause] up toh that, we will open questions. [indiscernible] do you know how many conductors there were during the civil war . How many people did harriet transport . Ms. Clinton i always say nobody knows, but we make educated guesses. And this is one of the controversial areas where biographers disagree. I think we choose to disagree. I mean, i could make the argument that whether she only smuggled her sister to safety a few months after her own selfliberation, or she smuggled several hundred that were reported, when she would speak. Another biographer has suggested there were only verifiable 70 cases. But we are talking about a clandestine network of people. We do know, for example, that there is a case where tubman smuggled nearly a dozen fugitives to freedom. And she took them to upstate new york and then across the border. Of we find an example Frederick Douglass talking about someone coming to his house with 11 fugitives that he keeps safe in upstate new york. So we only have these snatches and we do not have full evidence. And if you could be put in jail for having a banned book in your house, you can imagine how africanamericans feared. And we know after 1850, with the passage of the fugitive slave personal liberty laws, which were put forward in pennsylvania and other places, where overturned by the federal government. Im sure you have heard of that here in virginia, the battle between federal and state. And it is going on from time in a mortal. And it goes on during this period. But in 1850, many africanamericans who have settled for decades or more are very fearful. Very fearful. In philadelphia, for example, where William Still worked to move people out, we know a very African American was hauled in front of the court and a slave catchers that this was a runaway. And he was known to people in the court, including the judge, to have been a resident of philadelphia for over a decade. So we have these battles. We do not know the numbers. They are disputed. I used to get calls every spring about these kinds of disputes. They seem to have died down. Theuse i think insensitivity of trying to gauge tubmans a couple is meant by numbers does not really, i think gel for us. ,and also, a greater awareness that records are hidden. Cap a still kept a record of those yet saved, but he had to keep it in a tree until after the war. Eric former talks about a list he found, hidden in an archive, and only brings it out to the 21st century. Those dumpsters will yield things, those records will yield things. I know, when i did my first book, i went around encouraging your attics. To an encouraging you to give away your paper, but take your papers to get copied to keep it safe. Thank you for your question. I really enjoyed your presentation. A couple of points. One is was she involved with john brown . There is some information about he consulted her and she could not go with them because of illness. Ms. Clinton again, when i say there are controversies. ,ne of my reviewers said she quote, faked her illness so she would not be involved in the disastrous run. But she was involved with brown, she understood his project. He was someone who really converted her to the notion of slavery as war. When she was a young woman, just married, she hired a lawyer to look up her papers to see if her mother was not free, technically, when she was born. And when she discovered that this slippery slope that so many slaveholders practiced was a deceit upon her mother, i think that turned her, in a way, toward breaking down unjust laws. And certainly john brown was a very charismatic figure. She met with him in upstate new york. He was soliciting in canada. She raised money for him, she spoke for him. She had to use a pseudonym, harriet garrison, when she was speaking in boston, because she did not want to get caught in her association. But it is true that brown kept postponing the date and sending information back and forth. But new work on brown shows that this conspiracy was known by scores of people. So by the time that brown launched his raid, it was well known among abolitionist circles. And i think that she was concerned about keeping her goety and her ability to south and her ability to continue to rescue. I mentioned these abductors. We do not use that term, because it has a flavor to it. But she would hear from the Family Member that someone needed to be rescued, and she would undertake individual rescues. And again, i think that that work had become very personal and powerful to her. Browns plan of an uprising was one that she pulled supported in theory. She knew him. She respected him. She was one who welcomed him as a comrade rather than a martyr. He calls her general. He also used the male pronoun. So i know maybe some of my younger colleagues will transgender her. My i actually think that book does not try and do that. Actually, i have sort of an oprah angle that she married a younger man the second time around. Someone she met at work, during the liberation of slaves behind enemy lines during the war. So it was a wartime romance. He was released. Nelson brown was released in brownsville, texas. And he met up with her in auburn, new york. Get a map. He made his way to her. She remarried. So my review of her was she was so much a warrior that john brown called her general and treated her to the male pronoun. The second part is how did fugitive sthe 1850 lave passage. She was moving in and out and possibly everyone knew who she was. How did she maneuver that situation . Ms. Clinton it is interesting because in mcphersons book, he talked about accounts of black women were invisible. So the invisibility of black women was something they used. And there was a moment where harriet was on a train she also, by the way, frequently took a train south, because a black woman going south was not as suspect as a black woman on a train going north. So she would gather her money, goout, go south, specifically to rescue individuals. And there are times when she would always travel at night. Thewould always travel example i gave, trying to find, in the woods, some safety. But never traveling by day. And she has certain routes she would follow on the delmar peninsula. She knew safe stations. She also i think it is so wonderful with this disappeared image, the new image of her. It was a carte dvis. Tubman would often take a cartedvis with her. She would show it to a person, and if they knew the name of who it was, then they were a safe person. She had a way of making her rounds. So many were able to help her. There was a real record and out into the south during this. Upstate newthrough york. And she would make her way to canada, Saint Catherines, and deliver people to safety. That was really her skill, her talent. Sheshe would not do it when was unwell. She did have unwell spells. I mention her illness that we do not have a record of. What she could do any rescues but that she could do any rescues under her conditions was quite remarkable. Thank you for your questions. While visiting one of these spots in western tennessee, which i assume is a western route they displayed, i guess, a they said was a roadmap that slaves used as directions. Wasnt something that Harriet Tubman would use as guidance for the eastern route . Ms. Clinton i am afraid i have to dispel the myth of the quilt code. Sorry. Tubman was a quilter. We have quilts on her bed in her own house, as well as the Harriet Tubman home. But the thought that quilts were symbols that africanamericans used for a safe salsas safehouses is not substantiated. I think we have done a lot of scholarship to dispel that particular myth. At the same time, as one of the few women we can name, study, and find so much information on, we do have to acknowledge that a quilt may have played an Important Role in her escape. She may have used it as payment to someone in the neighborhood in order to obtain food and hiding during the initial stages of her escape. But again, this is all materially put together. I have twice bought a Harriet Tubman underground railroad set. You can buy them off the internet. And theyhave a family have a quilt and they have the cabin, and then they have a bloodhound. To me, it is like the gun problem. Really . A bloodhound would be included in the underground railroad toy set . Because not thinking the letter sound would be not associated would be notd associated with the family aspect that but the dog that would be tracking her during that period. Do you see yourself becoming key member of a push for be on theobama to money or a black king of england on the pound . Ms. Clinton no, sir, im not advocate of barack obama on the money. There are two game rules, one of them i wish all of the republican candidates would have known when they suggested their mothers is you have to be dead to be on american currency. [laughter] thus my vociferous response to that. Im serious. I was very surprised to learn, as i think Many Americans were, is it is the portfolio and decision alone of the secretary of the treasury, not congress, not the white house. So it really is something that has to do with currency design. And i learned a lot about it. I do think that we can honor those people in our past. One of the things i talked to secretary lew about is Harriet Tubman took three years, but she had testimony from generals. Testimony from upstate people who need her as a philanthropist. She earned the respect of so many, and she was deeply patriotic. She asked for the money and said i, who have done so much, why , should i not be entitled to what others are. For the flag. She was eventually given a pension. I think honoring her because she was him who did work for the American Government works for me. And i am also in favor of the act that secretary lew tried to talk about the way in which currency tells a story. So how many of us know that there are certain countries and places where u. S. Currency serves as currency in foreign nations . And certainly your dollar is , circulated outside the united states. In wide circulation. And quite frankly, it hardens me to think that countries all over this hemisphere and in other places will look at that picture and want to know about who is on the money. Internet, they say, on the day of the announcement with people trying to Google Tubman and find out all about her. Butink it would be fitting, i will say, interesting, i told secretary lew how brave he was , because in the u. K. , they had a movement to put women on monday, and the woman who say sister said that was threatened. So that youon was all at because she suggested that jane austen might go on the money. Jane austen is on the money. But again, as a historian, i bearing those who have passed and made and a congressman or that is why i think it is fitting that it is tubman, because she was not recognized in her own time. She was impoverished, yet she was working in a charity to help others. She was raising money for schools, even though she was illiterate. The flag, trying to get women to vote. Nothing, i hope you understand, tennantthe most former of the white house tenant of the white house at all, but nevertheless, i will not be leading that campaign. First, i would like to thank you for this great, indepth, presentation. You did a wonderful job. My question is that you said Harriet Tubman had married twice. Do you know if she ever had any children . Ms. Clinton thank you for another controversy. [laughter] its quite intense and interesting. When i began my biography, i was quite struck by the fact that she had attracted so many young girls in her household. There is a picture you can see that is often described as Harriet Tubman and slaves she rescued. It was not at all did she adopted nieces. There was a particular young girl who she did bring into auburn. And there was a great deal of controversy about this young girl, who, clearly she adopted and favored and took in as her own. And that daughter, alice, became a favorite. So we have a clear family connection. And the story was that this was a daughter of one of harriets brothers that was free and was brought up to auburn. And then it gets very murky. And you do find a lot of the extended family being a bit unkind. I found an incident where she was referred to as a pumpkin hussy. So i tried to look into the language of the period, the attitude of the period, and it was no surprise to me that kate larson and i came out with our biographies around the same time, and we came to the same conclusion that it was a possibility this child was harriets own child by birth, that she had given up, then she rescued that child to freedom and was given a home and freedom. Her descendents became educators, in a way. It is something that i think fits with the larger profile. How she never acknowledged it or how she never spoke about it i think shows a lot of her character and dignity during that period. During the civil war, there were times when females would come into the army camp in south carolina, and she would be very protective of them. And she would be very aware, sensitive, to the issue that africanamerican women often could not protect themselves. And this time it was from the Union Soldiers as well as from the larger Southern Community around. And she would not send this young woman north until she could find a funeral escort to go with her and take her. Sorry see there are examples is quite aware of this. But we do not have letters, we do not have testimony. We do have many collateral descendents of her brothers and sisters who she brought to freedom who got to survive. But only this one, margaret, might have been her own daughter. And larson and i believe that and have written about that and some other writers have looked into this as well. I think we have time for two more questions. Yes, thank you. I am curious you raise the idea of the invisibility of the africanamerican woman. And that brought to my mind Elizabeth Kegley. So i am curious if. Tubman and Harriet Tubman interactions, any whether in the civil war period or after. Ms. Clinton such a good question. It is something i have thought about. No, i do not have evidence. A lot of us try to plot where people were. Most recently, president obama named beaufort as a National Park for reconstruction. So i was asked if tubman was there. Part of the answer is that we, in the field, go around trying to find intersections and moments. So we say, for example, Elizabeth Kegley must have known harriet jacobs, because they were in washington working on contraband at the same time. Harriet tubman must have known Francis Watkins up in the north. They were at the same small town in canada at the same time. But they did not have smartphones. [laughter] they did not have facebook locator. We cannot really find this, and there is no real evidence of it to you but i have worked on k egley in my mrs. Lincoln biography. She is receiving a lot of attention, and im very pleased of her portrait in the lincoln film. So im sorry cannot make these connections. But it is for your generation and the next generation to keep in the archives, as well as the dumpsters, in biography classes , as well as out onsite. Thank you. Thank you very much for your time and for your informative discussion about Harriet Tubman. I wanted to know how you think she you mentioned that she had a Christian Faith that guided her. I want to know how you think she came by her Christian Faith. And i am also i have a lot of questions but i will stop with , what piqued your interest that you wanted to become a biographer of Harriet Tubman . Ms. Clinton thank you for that. Well, i can say i found the religion question quite compelling to me. And when i was talking to a variety of editors about my biography, i had one or two of them who would confront me and said, you know, i read that Harriet Tubman thought she could talk directly to god and she could follow his instructions, so how are you going to handle that . And i said, you are right. You know. Im going to write in my book that Harriet Tubman thought she spoke brightly to god and tried to follow what she thought were the guidelines of christianity. And i am only joking about this, because she was a miracle maker. She is someone who would go into the office and say, i need money to rescue someone. Thomas garrett would be so taken aback, because money would just come in to rescue someone. She prayed, fervently. She was out in a swamp in a group and was afraid of discovery. She was someone who believed that her strong faith led her through. Fear, manyoments of moments of danger. I think it is something that is important. She also believed in individual will. I am often asked why did children children are so fascinated by her. Shocked, again, when i was teaching and we were learning about the great women and we were studying theory, which i really appreciated. But i wanted to know more about the study of the impact of the war and race and emancipation and emancipation studies was , growing in importance. So i was contemplating writing a larger study of women in the civil war. Had written in my first book on white women in the civil war, so i started writing about African Women africanamerican women after the civil war. Harriet tubman came up, and i thought the neglect of her was very unfortunate. Because i think american schoolchildren have been really heartened and inspired by her example. One person can make a difference. One person can change another persons life, saving them. And i think that very powerful message, coming in at a time when our country was contemplating holocaust studies, when our country was facing eradication of people because of their color or faith. She believe that sh came to me as someone whose full story, she should not be a folk character, she should be what she was. A very significant activist for