Jeanine Michna-Bales - Through Darkness to Light: Photographs Along the Underground Railroad

Traveling by Moonlight, 2014

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2017 Jeanine Michna-Bales
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Editor: Jenny Florence
Design: Paul Wagner, Mia Johnson

Special thanks to: Janet Behning, Nicola Brower, Abby Bussel, Erin Cain, Tom Cho, Barbara Darko, Benjamin English, Jan Cigliano Hartman, Lia Hunt, Valerie Kamen, Simone Kaplan-Senchak, Stephanie Leke, Diane Levinson, Jennifer Lippert, Kristy Maier, Sara McKay, Jaime Nelson Noven, Esme Savage, Rob Shaeffer, Sara Stemen, Joseph Weston, and Janet Wong of Princeton Architectural Press
Kevin C. Lippert, publisher

Library of Congress
Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Michna-Bales, Jeanine
Through darkness to light : photographs along the underground railroad / a photographic essay by Jeanine Michna-Bales
ISBN 978-1-61689-565-5 (alk. paper) | ISBN 978-1-61689-609-6 (epub, mobi)
. Underground RailroadPictorial works.. Underground Railroad.. Fugitive slavesTravelUnited StatesHistoryPictorial works . African AmericansHistory19th centuryPictorial works.. Historic sitesUnited StatesPictorial works.
LCC E .M 2017 | DDC 973.7/11500222 dc

ANDREW J. YOUNG

JEANINE MICHNA-BALES

PART I
THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD

Bound for Freedom:
The History of the Underground Railroad

FERGUS M. BORDEWICH

Let Freedom Ring:
The Underground Railroad Comes Alive

ERIC R. JACKSON

ROBERT F. DARDEN

PART II
THE JOURNEY: A PHOTOGRAPHIC ESSAY

T hroughout my life and work I have been inspired by the stories and the legacy of the Underground Railroad. I remember, in particular, a phrase attributed to Harriet Tubman that I very much admire. When told of all the slaves she brought to freedom, she is said to have remarked, I could have freed a thousand more if only they knew they were slaves. I think of her words today when I see how many people fail to understand the extent to which they may still be enslaved. Not in the sense of the chain and the whip, but in the sense of the modern mechanisms that manipulate us into being consumers rather than people. In fact, Martin Luther King Jr. used to say, Going from a brown bag to a martini glass is not freedom. In his mind, that was one of the dangers of the black bourgeoisunwittingly becoming slaves of materialism.

The Underground Railroad has been described as the first civil rights movement in the United States because it blurred racial, gender, religious, and socioeconomic lines and united people in the common cause of ending the injustice of slavery. I agree, and would offer the Amistad Rebellion and the group of slaves that mutinied off the coast of Long Island as an example of a similar, and connected, campaign. They were jailed in New Haven and most spoke the same language, so they had the benefit of communication and developed a leadership structure. These leaders, with the help of alumni of Yale University, persuaded former president John Quincy Adams to come out of retirement and successfully argue their case for freedom. More than half of them returned to Freetown, Sierra Leone, while a few remained, including a young woman, Sarah Margru Kinson, who would attend Oberlin College. In my opinion this was the start of the anti-slavery movement in the United States, and it was initiated by white people who recognized in black people a humanity that before they had not been willing to see or that they had not had the chance to see. In this same manner, the Underground Railroad serves as a constant reminder that those in bondage had help, and that we should always strive to help others in need.

The spirituals and songs of the Underground Railroad also had an impact that can still be heard today. These songs were an essential part of the modern civil rights movement. I remember how we sang,

Freedom

Oh Freedom over me

And before Id be a slave,

Id be buried in my grave.

Woke up this morning

with my mind stayed on Freedom

Now, normally that was, Woke up this morning, with my mind stayed on Jesus. We changed it to Freedom. And Martin Luther King Jr. used to quote, Jeremiah, is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? He would say that black men and women in slavery took Jeremiahs question mark and straightened it out into an exclamation point. And they sang,

There is a balm in Gilead

that makes the wounded whole.

There is a balm in Gilead

that heals the sin-sick soul

So, when I get discouraged

and think my works in vain

Then comes the Holy Spirit

to revive my soul again

Because there is a balm in Gilead

that makes the wounded whole.

The theme of faith in the midst of darkness appeared in the spirituals of the 1800 s and in the music of the 1960 s, during the civil rights movement, such as this song by Curtis Mayfield:

Its all right, have a good time

Cause its all right, whoa, its all right

and in 1980 s Jamaica when Bob Marley sang,

One love

One heart

Lets get together and feel alright

and most recently when Kendrick Lamar rapped a piece that ends with everybody jumping up and shouting

But, if God got us then gon be alright

One thing is certain: the answer has been in front of us for years. Like the Underground Railroad, if we all work together

I gotta feeling everythings gonna be all right.

Through Darkness, 2014

G rowing up in the Midwest, the Underground Railroad was understandably an important part of our school curriculum given that some of the routes ran literally through our backyards. I became fascinated with the topic, and often imagined what it must have been like to walk thousands of miles for the chance to be free.

Years ago, I started to writewith a pen on paperthree pages a day. Most of the time I write whatever random thoughts come to me or just list things that have to be done before I can board a plane the next day. Sometimes, though, Im rewarded for my effort and an exciting idea appears on the page. Such was the case about fifteen years ago when I started to get back into photography. I began to imagine what the journey north to freedom on the Underground Railroad would have looked like through the eyes of one individual.