Director 10-13

What was the overall theme of the novel?

How did it make you feel when Emma saw Fanny in New York?

Would you have fled to Canada if you were in this same situation? Why/why not?

If you could change the ending, would you? Why? How would you change it?

Vocabulary Ch 10-13

"Leastways" Pg. 134 - Winnie

"whupped" Pg. 145 - Emma

"have mercy" Pg. 156 - Joe

"it does my heart good" Pg. 161 - Fanny Kemble

"unscrupulous" Pg. 162 - Fanny Kemble as an old woman

Connector 10-13

I found it really interesting that Emma and Joe settled in Nova Scotia, Canada. I did some research and here's a good website that shows a timeline of African Americans immigrating to Canada. Turns out that even after the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act was passed, bounty hunters even kidnapped blacks in Canada and sold them to the southern states. http://blackhistorycanada.ca/timeline.php?id=1800

I also thought it was very honorable that Emma's husband Joe joined the Union Army and ended up losing his life fighting against slavery. I found a great website that gives more information about African American soldiers in the Civil War. Turns out that African Americans made up 10% of the Union Army. http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/blacks-civil-war/

Connector 7-9

http://www.shockfamily.net/underground/runaway.html

This is a link to a story about a Runaway Slave.

Of course when you think of runaway slaves, you automatically think of Rosa Parks:

http://www.rosaparks.org/

http://www.runawayslavemovie.com/site/

This is an actual documentary which talks about the economic issues that runaway slaves dealt with as well as the fight to be "free at last" from slavery.

Director Ch 7-9

1. In Sarah's interlude she talked about her father and said, "I had no respect for him as a man, no respect for how he had lived his life, Yes, he was my father and I honored him because he had helped to give me life. More than that I could not do" (p 111). What's the difference between respecting someone and honoring someone?

2. Why do you think Samson never told his son how he tried to escape slavery when he was younger?

3. What do you think about Samson's argument, is it better for a slave to have a master and not worry about basic necessities, or be free and worry about tomorrow?

4. Do you think Samson gave up too easily after being on the run for three days?

Vocab Ch 7-9

"I can hear my blood boiling like hot water in a tea kettle." -Mattie (pg 101)

"You done wrong this day and Satan is going to put you on the fire like you was pork ribs at a barbecue." -Mattie (pg 103-104)

"... the grief weighing us down like we carrying mules on our shoulders." -Will (pg 105)

"...jumped the broom" -Joe (114)


The slaves vocabulary is very descriptive and full of symbolism and metaphors. Their grammar has several errors, but their colorful language is very interesting to study.

Investigator Ch 5-6

After reading so much about the slave trade in these chapters, I decided to do some research on slave prices. According to my research, some of the slaves in the Butler auction sold for well above average prices. Prices for a male slave peaked when the slave was between the ages of 20 and 30. The price pattern was similar for female slaves. Young children and babies were worth much less than slave children who had approached puberty. Also, experience played a role in determining the cost of a slave. Women who were fertile and of child bearing age were worth more than other women because of their ability to provide the master with more slave children. Certain attributes including disabilities and specific skills could either lower or raise the price, respectively. Furthermore, just as the stock market increases and decreases today to determine different costs of products, back then, the slave trade was almost treated as a stock market. If the demand was down, then the costs went down. It was all about supply and demand.

http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/wahl.slavery.us

Investigator Ch 7-9

I wanted to look into the underground railroad that Emma, Joe, and Charles were planning to take to get to Ohio and see if there was really a route that would take them from Kentucky to freedom. I found this map that shows the routes of the Underground Railroad, and it looks like there was a perfect route from Kentucky to Cincinnati. I think this map is really cool because I can visualize how far some slaves had to travel to get to the "free" north, and how difficult their journeys must have been. The website I got this image from is www.slaveryinamerica.org.

Connecter Ch 5-6

http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/murray:@field(DOCID+@lit(lcrbmrpt2305div7))

The above link tells the love story of Jeffrey and Dorcas. It is taken from a pamphlet titled “What became of the slaves on a Georgia plantation? : Great auction sale of slaves, at Savannah, Georgia, March 2d & 3d, 1859. A sequel to Mrs. Kemble's Journal” that Julius Lester drew a lot of the novel from. The story from the pamphlet is a little different from the book, because it says that Dorcas was sold with a family of four others, and that is why Jeffrey’s master will not buy her.

http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/murray:@field(DOCID+@lit(lcrbmrpt2305div6))

The pamphlet also has a small section about Bob and Mary, characters portrayed in Ch 5, that you can access from the above link!

Discussion Ch 5-6

1) Sarah is obviously very upset about Emma being sold and acted out a few times at the auction. How do you think she will act towards her father and Frances once they get home?

2) Slave buyer 4 is called over to a stall by a slave named Bob. Bob's wife, Mary, seems a little hesitant about how slave buyer 4 was looking at her. Do you think that a lot of slaves were in denial or naive about what could potentially happen to their wives? Or do you think they just knew and were okay with it?

3) How do you foresee how Emma's mother, Mattie, will feel once they get home from the auction? How do her and Jeffrey's feelings compare?

Vocab Ch 5-6

I found it interesting reading the slaves dialogue in chapter 5. There were a lot of phrases the slaves used when talking to other masters, that had not been widely used in the first part of the book.

Suh......p 54

Sunup to Moondown......p54

She sho' can..........p54

There is her..........p71

I liked how the author wrote these passages in the slave vernacular, because it makes the plot more authentic.

Vocab Ch 1-4 Day of Tears

In these chapters, I noticed that the characters obviously use a very different dialect. Here are some examples of how different language was back during this time.

-"Say" instead of "said"

-"What" instead of "that" (which was one I have never heard before.) ("The one what bought my sister didn't even let her say good-bye to me.")

-"Was" instead of "were"

-"Think" instead of "thinks"

-"Knowed" instead of "knew"

-"Good Book" is referred to as the Bible

A strange phrase I noticed was "The rain comes down like fiery sorrow." I have never heard this phrase before.

Connector 1-4

http://www.glynngen.com/slaverec/butler.htm
This site actually lists out the names and prices of the slaves sold in the Butler auction. It has other notes that the author of the site found during research. It's actually a really cool website, so check it out!

The Butler auction is often referred to as "the weeping time," which explains why the book was given its' title.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4p2918.html
"It is a dreadful affair, however, selling these hereditary Negroes. . . . Families will not be separated, that is to say, husbands and wives, parents and young children. But brothers and sisters of mature age, parents and children of mature age, all other relations and the ties of home and long association will be violently severed. It will be a hard thing for Butler to witness and it is a monstrous thing to do. Yet it is done every day in the South. It is one among the many frightful consequences of slavery and contradicts our civilization, our Christianity, or Republicanism. Can such a system endure, is it consistent with humanity, with moral progress? These are difficult questions, and still more difficult is it to say, what can be done? The Negroes of the South must be slaves or the South will be Africanized. Slavery is better for them and for us than such a result."
-Philadelphia socialite Sidney George Fisher regarding the Butler auction

http://www.savannahga.gov/cityweb/rlibcat.nsf/f0bad60b4a15a12785256b1b006ac5ad/3e173fa8463ec3f6852572ec00412ebd?OpenDocument
This website is from the city of Savannah, GA. It discusses the different laws and the timeline regarding slavery in Savannah.

Other books:
Saving Savannah
Savannah Tempest: the Hidden Savannah

Investigator Ch 1-4

I found it very interesting that Sarah and France's mother was an English actress, and was only allowed to see her children only twice a year. I questioned why did their mother marry their father, if she had such strong feelings against slavery? I did a little research about actress Fanny Kemble and about her marriage to Pierce Butler. Fanny came from a famous theatrical family and in 1832 she toured the US. She was a very independent woman and had strong beliefs about anti-slavery. She married Pierce Butler in 1834 whom was a Philadelphia native, but inherited his family's Georgia plantation only after their two daughters were born. In 1838 they traveled south to inspect their new land and 1000 slaves, and she was shocked by their living conditions. She kept a one year account recording the horror's of slavey, and published her observations in "Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation." Her work was praised by abolitionists and union supports across the country. She left the south in 1839; the couple divorced in 1849. She continued acting to support herself and writing against slavery. She never remarried.

Discussion Director Questions Chapters 1-4!

1. Why do you think Frances took after her father and had no feelings that the slaves were people like Sarah did?
2. Why do you think the master was able to get custody of the two girls?
3. Do you think master and Frances are wrong for their thoughts, or is it not their fault because that's the way they were raised?
4. What do you think will happen to Emma?