Celebrating the Black History of Your Community

Welcome to Balancing Life’s Issues the podcast. Today we are wrapping up Black History Month with a call to action. Reach out to your community.  

In our concluding episode Kai Sorensen, Director of Podcasts and Chester NY resident, delved into his community to explore its Black history. It was during his interaction with Clifton and Leslie of the Chester Historical Society that he uncovered the profound Black history embedded in his town. Little did he know, the town where he and his wife chose to establish their home and raise a family was just steps away from an underground railroad station.

And it all started with a photo...

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
- The years that ReverendWood labored among the people
of Chester were crucial and exciting ones.
In the spring of 1859, afugitive slave who had traveled
for eight days on the road from Delaware
arrived in Chester, New York.
- Welcome- To Balancing Life's Issues, the podcast.
Today we are wrapping up BlackHistory Month with a call

(00:21):
to action reach out to your community.
But why? Well, if there'sanything I've learned this month,
it's that learning about oneanother can be challenging.
At first, I was nervous going into many
of these conversationsbecause I was afraid
of saying the wrong thingor offending a colleague.
But that's the point. We have to be able
to navigate difficult conversations

(00:42):
so we can learn from oneanother so we can empathize,
so we can help one another.
Black History Month isabout celebrating our shared
history as Americans.
And the resilience of Black Americans
through adversity is worth celebrating,
not removing instead,
but you have to make an effort
to move in a vulnerabledirection of curiosity
because you might not like whatyou find out about yourself.

(01:05):
And for those of us who don't have access
to the experts at BLIthat I've had the pleasure
of learning from this month,start with your community
and its historical society.
Because for me, it allstarted with a photo.
When my wife and I moved toChester, New York in the summer
of 2020, we never thoughtthat almost four years later,

(01:27):
we would own the home We were renting
and have an eight month old
who literally learnedhow to crawl last night.
We assumed this was just a stepping stone
to wherever we would end up post pandemic,
but we fell in love with the community.
And it was through the home buying process
that we discovered that ourhouse was built in 1842.
So as a Christmas giftfrom my wife, I reached out
to the local Historical Society in hopes

(01:48):
that there was a photoI could frame from like
the sixties or seventies.
But what I got back fromClifton via email was a whole
file on our home.
- So I see a bunch of children,
and it looks like thisis from a long time ago.
- That's Greg, multimediaspecialist at Balancing Life's

(02:09):
Issues, describing this photoof our home from the 1840s
when it used to be a school.
- Right. This is probably like the entire
elementary school Yeah.
- Of, of the town. Right.
- And it's like, not that many.
It's probably what,like 20 children? Yeah.
And it's girls and boys,um, a lot of white children,
but it does look like there are two,

(02:31):
- Yeah, two, maybethree children of color.
- The, the more I look at it,
the more actually childrenof color that I see
- In New York state where we live.
Slavery was not abolisheduntil March 31st, 1817,
setting July 4th, 1827 as thedate of final emancipation

(02:52):
and making New York thefirst state to pass a law
for the total abolition of legal slavery.
So as I look at this photoof my home that was built
as a school 25 years
after emancipation in New York,
it's no surprise thereare children of color.
Maybe some of them arefirst generation children
of former slaves.
And as I shared this photoaround town to locals

(03:12):
that we had become friendswith, they entered,
shared the widely known rumorthat Chester New York was part
of the Underground Railroad.
Little did I know that for a time,
the Underground Railroadstation in Chester
was only steps from my front door.

(03:34):
Hi Clifton. Hey, how you doing? Good.
- How are you?- Good, good. Leslie Smith.
Hi, Leslie. I had to find out
what else Clifton knew aboutthe Black American history
of Chester, and it was to no surprise
that he was happy to tell me what he knew.
So I met him at his house. So is this the
historical society?
And you know, you're in theright place when you think
you're at the Chester Historical Society,

(03:55):
but you're actually atthe historian's home?
- Well, my name's Cliff Patrick.
I'm the town of Chester historian,
and I was, uh, appointed in 2003
- And his wife and clearlypartner in crime, uh,
- Leslie Smith.
And I was president of theChester Historical Society,
I am gonna say 1994, in 1995.
- And as I sat down,there were piles of papers
and photos that Clifton hadclearly spent hours pouring over

(04:18):
concerning the blackhistory of Chester, all
of which was so fascinating.
The most relevant though,to me were the stories of
where I find myselfbuying Farm Fresh produce.
And the Underground Railroad station
just steps from our home. This
- Is the, uh, document I mentioned to you.
Uh, it's, it's, um, from 1720 when, uh,
Daniel Crimeline mortgagebasically mortgaged his or sold

(04:40):
or mortgaged his property, uh, which
- Was, so this, this is the,- This, uh, an indenture.
He binds, uh, binds himself his son
and his properties, whichat the time was 3066 acres.
So we covered much
of the northern part ofthe town of Chester. And
- This property you'retalking about, this is the
where Rose Orchard is in
- Yeah.

(05:01):
Rose Orchard. Gotcha.
And attached to this wasa, um, memorandum, which,
um, lists the chattel.
And chattel is likepersonal property as opposed
to, uh, real property.
And it does specifically list, uh,
three slaves includedalong with some cattle.
Wow. And two of them are Indian
and one is colored, uh, negro,

(05:23):
- An amendment to these mortgaging, or
however you wanna put it, of the property,
included this personal list.
Right. Which puts threehuman lives. Mm-Hmm.
, uh, in the same level
or the same piece of paper as cattle.
- Yeah. Yeah. But thisis, as far as we know,
this is the only existingdocument proves the evidence
of Indian slaves in Orange County.
Okay. Very cool. So it's, you know,

(05:44):
it's very unique at that level.
- So a place that my wife
and I go often for the best produce
and apple cider donuts
around had slaves on itsproperty years ago, way
before the time of its current owners.
But what about this Underground Railroad
- With the Fugitive Slave Actthat was passed about 1850,
it became illegal to, uh,harbor or assist escape slaves.

(06:05):
A lot of, um, people didn'ttalk about breaking law.
- Right. You wouldn't want to write down
what you were doingillegally, um, at that time.
Mm-Hmm. . So Iguess there's probably not much
documented in that way,
- Uh, less than, um, otherfactors of our, uh, social life.
Sure. But, um, firsttime I heard about, um,
underground Railroad was, uh, uh, a rumor

(06:28):
that there was a tunnelunderneath the high Street,
- Which in the street we live on. Mm-Hmm.
- connecting,uh, what's now known as 15, um,
15 High Street with thehouse across the street.
I heard stories, uh,actually one from, uh,
bill Durland who died a few years ago.
But he, as a child, um,he said that there was a,

(06:51):
uh, time he was kid.
There were all theselittle like Heidi places
in the house, like, oh,
- Fun, fun for a kid.
But little did he know,
- Oh, yeah, yeah.
Behind the closets. Um,
- So this would be okay.
Yeah. I, I see, I know,I recognize the pillars.
So this is the home in across the street?
Across the street. During
- The 1850s.
It was the home of the, itwas the parsonage for the, uh,

(07:13):
Chester Presbyterian ChurchPastor at that time was, uh,
James Wood, I believe.
Reverend James Wood. Yep. Yep. And, uh,
- Now this is Helen Fred Morris's history
of the Presbyterian Church. Oh, okay.
- Got it.- The years that Reverend Wood labored
among the people of Chesterwere crucial and exciting ones.
In the spring of 1859, afugitive slave who had traveled

(07:34):
for eight days on the road from Delaware
arrived in Chester, New York.
According to the FugitiveSlave law, the people
of Chester were duty boundto take him into custody
and surrender him to federal authorities
to be returned to his master.
However, a collection was taken for him.
He was given a ticket on the Erie Railroad
and sent on to Elmira, New York,

(07:56):
where he was much fartheron his journey to Canada.
The curiosity and conjectureresulting from this incident in
Chester was all unknown tothe unsuspecting public,
very close to a very important station
of the Underground Railroad.
The terminus of a linerunning from Philadelphia
through New Jersey,
and across the town ofWarwick to Walton Lake

(08:17):
and to Chester, New York from Chester,
two lines continued northward.
The station in Chesterwas the Presbyterian
parsonage and the Wow.
And the station master wasthe Reverend James W. Wood.
The children of the Reverend Wood.
Among the directions thattheir father gave them were the
following, that when theysaw a certain carriage

(08:39):
approaching, they shouldopen the carriage house doors
and allow it to drive into the building.
Then they must close thedoors and go into the house.
The vehicle which hadarrived was the means
of transportation forthe, for the fugitives
from the depot at Walton Lake to Chester.
As soon as the Negroeswere securely concealed,

(09:00):
the carriage would depart
and go on its return toWalton Lake when federal men
and local spies became toobusy in the neighborhood,
the trip from Walton Lake
and back would be madein the dark of night,
less known than the Presbyterianparsonage at Chester
as a station was thehome of the Drake family.
This house referred toas Drake's Inn was one

(09:22):
of the very old homes in Chester.
The late Bell s told the oldhouse had recesses in the walls
where the slaves weresecreted when the Drake
family kept a station.
- You know, just as a historian,
and maybe we'll leaveit, we'll leave it here.

(09:42):
Like what, what do youfeel is the importance of,
of like educating ourselveson, on these kinds
of stories in, in our communities?
- Well, if you listento the news, you tend
to get little snippets and headlines.
Mm-Hmm. .But the human condition,
I think is much more involved
and complicated than just the headlines.
- There is so much prejudice,

(10:03):
but what is needed is education.
Right. So that even ifyou don't agree with a lot
of things, at least you knowwhere people are coming from.
Right. And you know, the reason
- I think it's a shamewhen people don't, uh,
don't have their minds open tolistening to the other side.
'cause separating it from the

(10:24):
hyperbole is, uh, sure, of course. The
- Hard part.
Yeah. That, that does seemlike the challenge right now.
Mm-Hmm. . And reach out
to your local historian.
Sure. See if they're willingto hang out and chat.
, that was pretty easy, .
I sent you one email and one phone call,
and now I'm sitting in your
home, uh, and you're just Mm-Hmm.
dropping all this on on us.
So, and it was at theend of our conversation
that Leslie brought the workwe do at BLI, full circle

(10:45):
community is just one ofthe five buckets you need
to throw water in sometimes
as it helps createbetter work life balance.
- When you said mental health and,
and, uh, mental health and wellness.
Yeah. I didn't leave the house.I didn't, I didn't drive.
I didn't, I I was afraid to, I was afraid
to leave my bedroom to actuallywalk, to go to the bathroom.
Wow. That's how bad Iwas in a, a historic,

(11:07):
and I went to a historicalsociety meeting.
I joined and I Oh, wow.And I got involved.
And I think that probablyled to getting back.
You know, I think what you're doing
that sounds very important.
Mm. I mean, when you said that,I was like, this is really,
you're really onto something here.
- Yeah. Yeah. If, if wecan pour ourselves into our
community, we learn more about each other,
we learn more about the diversity,

(11:28):
we learn more about the history,
and then we're just, we're all just
better people as a result.
Big thank you to Clifton
and Leslie of the ChesterHistorical Society
and to all of the BLI trainersthat helped produce content
for us as we celebratedBlack History Month.
It's up to you to make an investment

(11:49):
in your community today.
And who knows, maybeyou'll run into a couple,
just like Clifton and Leslie.
Until next time, everyone, take care.

(12:24):
This has been a productionof Balancing Life's Issues
with your hosts, Kai Sorenson
and Wendy Wallner, produced by me Kai.
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