CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — The author of a recent book on the path from human bondage to emancipation in Illinois will speak Nov. 8 at the University of Illinois.
M. Scott Heerman’s lecture, “Round About Midnight: Slavery and Freedom in the Land of Lincoln,” will be at 4 p.m. in Room 217 of Gregory Hall, 810 S. Wright St., Urbana.
The event is free and open to the public, the second of four in the Illinois Bicentennial Lecture Series.
Heerman’s book “The Alchemy of Slavery: Human Bondage and Emancipation in the Illinois Country, 1730-1865” spans a century and a half during which slavery was made, remade and eventually unmade in Illinois. He shows how the territory went from “Indian country” to European empire, and from a border south region to a bulwark of the free north.
Heerman, a University of Miami history professor, also shows how French, Spanish and Native American practices shaped the history of slavery in the U.S., and how a formidable cast of lawyers and antislavery activists – Abraham Lincoln among them – set their sights on ending slavery in Illinois.
Other upcoming lectures in the series:
- Feb. 20 – Loyola University Chicago historian Elliott J. Gorn, the author of a new book on Emmett Till, the Chicago boy whose 1955 murder in Mississippi helped spark the civil rights movement
- April 3 – Harvard University historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, the author of a recent book on early Mormonism, much of it set in Nauvoo, Illinois
The series is organized by the Center for Historical Interpretation in the department of history.
Editor’s notes: For additional information on speakers or the series, contact Robert Morrissey at 773-616-9292; email rmorriss@illinois.edu
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