Real Slaves Speak To Us from the 1930s. Could This Be Played In Schools Today? 

a brilliant description of Jim Crow segregation lived by this man - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-IXUFiXeNZV4.html

Imagine being so fearful of your baby being sold into slavery that you reckon that baby is better off dead. Terribly sad.

It should be played in schools today. Slavery was a near universal human institution around the world. Where there was not enslavement there was feudalism. History is nuanced and has much to teach us and should not be used for political soundbites only.

Sadly, this isn't something that just happened 150 years ago. This is something that happens today in many places around the world.

1965 I visited a museum that had been a house used for the underground railroad. On that visit there was what might have been the world's oldest docent. She was 105 years old. She was born a slave around 1860 and was officially freed at the age of five though she informed me that she was probably closer to ten when she learned she was free. She said there was little difference in life for her at the end of the Civil War. She still lived on the same plantation. The only real difference was her parents became share croppers and could not be sold and separated. Her master essentially took emancipation in stride. He offered all his slaves a share cropping arrangement where they would work the same fields growing the same crops they always had. Then they would pay the master rent in the form of the crops they grew. What was left in crops they kept for themselves and could sell them and use the money to buy food or other needed items. Mostly they grew cotton and tobacco. The land was still owned by the same plantation owner so he charged them rent for the same shacks they had lived in. He still gave them the same hand me downs that the former house slaves, become paid servants wore out. She said that after five years her parents told her they had enough money saved up and were leaving. How they managed that I don't know. She said she never stopped calling the plantation owner "Master" probably out of habit. She was just surprised to learn at around ten that they were in fact all free and had been for five years. Perhaps the parents just didn't want to get their hopes up until they were off the plantation. Then they moved up north. She told of how it got really bad in the south around the 1870's and how relatives of hers were lynched shortly after her family moved up north. Her mother had learned to read a little so they could right letters back and forth with relatives around the country who did the same. She stopped visiting the south after around 1900. Then the fear grew back in the 1920's when the klan became very popular in the north. She described the 4th of July parade one year either in or near Boston as including a hundred white robed klansmen marching carrying klan flags and such and she and her family who had been at the back of the crowd along the parade route due to Blacks not permitted in the front, just left and never went to another July 4 parade again. This was in the BOSTON area not the deep south. I was five years old and remember vividly how I thought her skin looked like wrinkled up old leather and how her voice and hands trembled but how she spoke with such quiet force of resolve. She really wanted me to know what happened. I can't remember a tenth of what she said but the above are highlights. What stuck in my mind the most was that I was five years old the same age she was a slave and how she described her chores. Not adult chores mind you but hard work. At five she worked 12 hours a day six days a week Monday through Saturday. She said the old master would have her work 7 days if the Lord let him. She picked cotton and carried water to the older slaves. She described how her mother sobbed inconsolably as she watched her get whipped by the overseer hanging from her ankles with her dress hung down over her face. All for steeling a peach that had fallen to the ground. At five.

Enslaved people are made visible when their voices are heard from the period of slavery. This makes them come alive as persons who were enslaved as opposed to being called a slave.

Slavery is as old as history. It is still happening today. I see reports of slavery in modern day Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and many other countries. It is tragic.

Makes one wonder. In 1969, while serving in the US Army. A fellow soldier & I stopped in a Cafe to eat lunch. The waitress came up and said they don't serve blacks. I was caught by surprise. I was instantly filled with anger. I confronted the waitress & the owner. I was a heartbeat from really attacking the owner. My buddy stopped me, he physically took hold of me and pulled me out of that Cafe before I did any real damage. I was livid. My buddy got me calmed down. We went to another place to eat and had no further problems. My buddy was very amazed at my anger. He had never had anyone white, get that upset over the racism around him. He was amazed that I had been ready to fight for him. He said it happens all the time. He calmed me down and told me that he had never seen a white man defend a black man like that. We had a good laugh over it. When he asked me why I had gotten so upset about it, I told him how I truly felt. I told him that we had just gone through 8 weeks of hell in BCT. That we had all been dumb civilians in the begining. We were individuals. But that had changed over the months of combat training. We had all hurt & bled together. We wore the green OD uniform. We had sweated & struggled as a group. I told him that all I saw now, were Soldiers! Word got around about what had happened. I had a number of fellow soldiers step forward to tell me they had respect for me. I was 17 years old. I still often remember that afternoon. 98% of our BCT brigade recieved orders for duty in Vietnam later that week. I wonder what ever happened to my buddy.

I am grateful for having many elder Negro friends who shared their memories about slavery when I was a child. Preciela was like a mother to me, starting as a young child and her assistance to my rearing, I will never forget. She could not read or write, but the love of her gentle hands taught me so many things about such as cooking and gardening, along with my mother, because of their long friendship. (Now she could firece, if anyone put their hands on me.) She made such an impression on my life and others that I could not stop reading history. "Why are people so mean?" I would often ask her sitting in her lap. Tears would sometimes well up in her eyes, and she would say softly, "I wished I's could keep you as a baby, but one day, you will understand. Growing up with dark skin, many have perished." I would just hug her and tell her how beautiful she was.

Valuable nuggets of wisdom here. Worth noting: a lot of these interviews are saved on the WPA website. I've been amazed by some of the stories; many thanks to you, David, for helping to put a human voice to something more than just dates and statistics.

😂 The fact you chose to cut this video so that it ends with "slavery, as a matter of fact, was _not_ good" absolutely made my day. Thank you, David Hoffman, as always, for your marvelous generosity and wealth of material culture from days gone by. These are incredible treasures for us to reflect on. I know it wasn't likely at the time, but I wish this fantastic information could have been delivered by someone from the family or community of the people whose words are recorded. We have grown more sensitive over the years, to how simply recording and reporting the perspectives of "others" perpetuates myths of the past as something that is separate from today. When these kinds of stories are documented, there are usually some invisible but invaluable persons helping the published authors by connecting them with the people with stories to share. Those persons are rarely afforded so much as an acknowledgement in the publication, whatever its form, but their knowledge and experience is always indispensable for making the research possible. Those persons ought to be recognized at least as coauthors, if not the true authors, except societal stratification blocks them at every level from participating in that kind of academic realm.

If American History is required in our schools, American slavery is certainly an integral part of it. Yet, it should be presented in a way to promote a peaceful brotherhood by learning from the horrible mistakes of the past. Parents especially should be the ones to help their children put things of this nature into a proper perspective, helping them to see and treat all people as equal members of the one human race.

David, I wish I had you as my high school history teacher in the 1970's the one I had put me to sleep. your film clips and documentaries and your description write up are very informative.

Thank you David 🙏🏾 Im 21 and man your life is only a dream to have as much historical films and research that isn’t shown anywhere I salute you for the amount of years you have stored in your vault.

"slavery, as a matter of fact, was not good"

My anglo family is from rural southeast Texas. My grandmother, with an accent so thick you could cut through, would tell me stories, many stories, similar to this. She wasn't on the right side of history, raised in ignorance with the bad traditions that come with it. Luckily for the grandchildren, my mother was the first to go to college. Her children went to Harvard and Stanford. Slavery, like Poverty, is a disease born of ignorance and many other things. We were raised to respect other peoples differences and merits, but it feels like the world we live in these days enjoys vanity and downright passive aggressive behvaior over accountability and equality. I was proud of the progress in the 1990s thru 2000s, but I don't know how to feel about the United States today.

What’s interesting, is that this woman reciting the stories refers to the WPA, the U.S. Government’s initiative to employ and enable people during the Great Depression, and rather than explaining it herself, she encourages them to reach out to people in their respective communities. That was a gentle tool she employed to foster a greater human bond and continuance of our shared memory. The human cruelty and inequity depicted was a fact of life. There was and still is a great cost to that relationship and America needs to own up to it.

Thanks for sharing this. This hurts to watch, but they should be playing this in schools.

This should be played in schools; it is a vital part of our history, and it goes on to this day. Our education is not limited to boundries.

I really appreciate that even in the 1930s they had the presence of mind to preserve this history and allow the slaves to tell their stories without censorship.

This is the real history. Stories from people. Pretty sickening how cruel man can be.

Thank you for sharing this, we should never seek to silence the voices of those who have suffered wrongdoing at the hands of their oppressors, nor should we ever cease to shine a light of truth on our shared history lest we forget and miss opportunities to do better by those who deserve to be treated with equality.

Thanks for this David! Of all the channels on RU-vid, you have the most authentic old videos.

Your work is brilliant by the way david. Thank you for all you've done. preserving & sharing such profound personal. Cultural & historic moments. Forever grateful for the work you've accomplished capturing humanity through out your career.

Thank you. This is only a drop in the ocean, but it hopefully helps our understanding a little more.

It is hard to imagine being so cruel to any living thing, and yet such cruelty is common

This gives me strength and helps me remember to keep going. Brothers and sisters today don't realize how hard it was back then. We came sooo far, only to regress into ignorance due to social media, tv and internet. SMH. The struggle continues... Thank you for this content!!!

What a shame our educational standards today are so low versus 5 decades ago

Thank you for the video. Such tragic stories.

Very interesting, David! As always, thanks for sharing.

This country needs more men like you Mr. Hoffman. Thanks for sharing

It's nice to meet you, friend. I really appreciate your sharing this with todays generations. It is so important that the reality of the hell that was is shared so that society will never make these mistakes again. Thank you so much for sharing. I wish you continued success and happiness always.

I e always found when I watch videos or see pictures of slaves and their stories they always hold themselves like royalty. Such suffering , such pin bit they look so majestic. They have so much strength in their eyes , I can’t explain it . These truly horrendous stories should be shouted from the roof tops, if we forget their stories we forget their names. I’m so glad you are preserving these stories of the voices that are always hidden.

Unfortunately, Florida will not allow this in schools. I was blessed to have been too young for the draft, but the right age for affirmative action opportunities. All I needed was a chance, not a handout. I earned a Bachelors degree and a Masters degree. I started multiple businesses and supported dozens of small businesses and bright employees. I retired this year at 65. I sometimes think about how many more people of color could've achieved great things if not for slavery and racial bias in the decades to follow.

This should be required to be played in all schools to all students. Especially where it has to be forced on a school board to show it.

Another absolute treasure. Now if we'd all simply treat one another like treasures as individuals and groups, all would be well.

Strange how such a short story can have such a powerful and lasting impact!

Absolutely should be played in school

Thank you for sharing this!

I’m proud to share while looking into my Ancestry DNA I had a great grandfather who fought for the North. Side note, it’s always fascinating to see how the world was back in these days. My grandfather was born in 1932 , so this video was how the world was during his formidable years.

It's no secret that countless Africans were captured by fellow Africans who later sold them to European traders. The fact that such atrocities have occurred in many places on this earth testifies that such evils cannot be viewed as the mark of any one variety of race or particular nationality. Hate has no one color, language or flag. Realizing this helps us to avoid taking an extreme position or revengeful attitude when confronted with such shocking history regarding racial or nationalistic hatred.

It hurts my heart... but needs to be known... thanks David 😎👍

That ending killed me. "Slavery was not good" What a take away 😂

Thanks for bringing these valuble and informative videos that help us to understand the good old days

"Slavery, as a matter of fact, was not good." We must not forget.

*teacher from 1956* "this can touch and teach students" *teacher from 2024* "I'm not allowed to teach anything about this because our state governor prohibits it"*

Good evening David, it could be ok to teach it in school now for history buff. Some school my not like it others may like it. I guess it hurts to see it and tell how it was. Thanks for sharing it.👍📸🙂

I was a little surprised at her last line. The fact that she had to say this at all, shows the progress that has been made in the last 50 years. Best to keep sharing the original words and let people reach their own conclusions, than to reinterpret things with CRT. We all figured it out just by learning actual history and speaking to people of other races. Thank you for sharing this!

Its really touching how that Yankee soldier tried his best to make her understand she was a human. I bet despite the switching it changed her life.

And yes. It should all be talked about, dissected, analyzed, studied. All of it. Frederick Douglas letters to his former master should be scrutinized in middle school. If nothing else. Great lesson in how to play the game. When to be stoic, when to fight, the power of words. And some serious lessons in understanding movements and the motivations behind them, the types of people they draw and how the momentum can be used to achieve a goal. Brilliant man.

This is what needs to be taught in schools. The history of what struggles African Americans went through. Not new pronouns we need our children to learn to not offend a "new" group of people.

I remember watching ’Dancing With Wolves’ as a teenager and realising how brutal the introduction of Europeans to the American continent was. Now slavery had an added dimension of sadism to the same brutality.

Thank you for uploading this. I took the liberty of downloading it for posterity in case the time comes that videos like this will be forbidden to be shared in America, starting with Florida where it is already a crime for teachers to do so in schools.

Though I clicked 'Like', this made my skin crawl. Thanks for the share. This is stuff schools would want to show if they get their hands on it. I hope it finds its way into schools, but RU-vid might just replace that function eventually. Preserve this gem.

Even though the way she ends it with "slavery as a matter of fact was not good." comes off as humorous now for being such an obvious statement, back then slavery was so normalized people seriously would not know this. They literally had carnival games that involved hurting slave children back then.

I wanna give a quick shout out to Irish and Chinese Americans. Their work has been overlooked for a long time

Thanks for sharing the stories.

Hi, David. Thanks for sharing such an interesting video. I should have known that it was you and your channel.

In some places, yes, this could be played in schools today. In my opinion though, this should be played in schools everywhere. I find it confounding to no end to know that racism still exists in this country, or anywhere for that matter.

Yes, it belongs in schools. Bring it to light and develop dialogue and understanding. If X can be taught and is part of the curriculum, then so can Y.

Likeness with Barbara Walters is remarkable. Saved, subscribed and THANK YOU TO THE CONTRIBUTORS AND PRODUCERS

Thanks for the video.

Beautiful and sad. Crazy to think that slavery still continues in this day in age in places like Asia, middle East ECT

Geezuz this needs to be heard. 😢😢😢

This particular era of slavery was tragic and every form of slavery is, but the truth is what The Lizard King said.

This should be read at schools, so people will understand the terrible conditions and teach what real victims are.

Should this be played and taught in schools? Absolutely. But with context. What should NOT be taught in schools is that this is still a current condition.

Its amazing how so many can be led to believe that other humans are less than human for any reason

I have a somewhat uncommon last name. Back in the 60's, if I was visiting a large city, I would look in the phone book to see if anyone had the same last name. I would call them and see how they might be related. While in Memphis, I called a man and he wanted to meet me. He gave me his address and directions and I went over there. I went to the door and knocked, and to my surprise, when he answered the door, he turned out to be black. He was retired from the military and, evidently, his ancestors were slaves on a small plantation outside of Atlanta. A plantation my ancestors owned. He said his great grandfather told him a little bit about those times. According to him, they were treated almost like part of the family and when the Emancipation Proclamation was declared in 1863, they all remained on the plantation. It was only when Sherman came through and burned Atlanta and destroyed the surrounding area that they all fled and took on the last name of their previous owners.

I’m so glad the commentator/host started off by saying this is American history! That’s exactly what it is and it should be taught in schools. This country is still trying to erase the parts of history that pertains to slavery and segregation. It may be an ugly part of history just like war, etc., but it needs to be remembered.

this is so sad. Humans can be very very terrible people.

It should be read in schools today. When I found out _Huckleberry Finn_ was banned or edited because of the way the main Negro character was addressed and treated, I was appalled. How ever will people understand the evolution of today's difficulties, if they do not see the accurate state of affairs in the past? The correct way to handle these things is to add a preamble to new printings, as has been done with restorations of old cinema recordings, or replays of older television shows: " This program contains descriptions and treatment of people, which may be offensive to current sensibilities. They reflect times when people did not know better, or knew, and did not care. We know better, and this is a reminder of why. We leave this as it was, to set the context of the time. This is not an endorsement, nor an approval, but simply an authentic representation of those times. We see, we learn, and we do better. Ignoring the lessons of the past deprives us of the impetus to avoid repeating it."

This was difficult to watch and hear. I know all of these things happened but it takes on a more truthful experience to hear the words of those human beings who were, through no fault of their own, considered less than human, just a piece of property owned by their masters. I am so glad that the abhorrent practice of slavery has been rightfully banished from our culture. What a punch in the gut to hear the words of these poor people speaking with a strong sense of fear and subservience. They weren't even afforded the basic human rights of Dignity and Respect. What a shameful legacy in American history.

This really did break my heart to hear.

My great great father at the age of 2 was sold off from his mother. After years of research and DNA I have been able to trace and reunite them

I was just thinking of Harriet Beecher Stowe and her book Uncle Tom's Cabin. It is 400 pages and each chapter is about 4 pages. I could only read a chapter per day. It was too difficult and heartbreaking. The USA did a terrible thing by allowing slavery. Why didn't they just hire and pay the workers and let them leave/quit if they wished?

Very insightful, Great video 👍👍 Great people ❤

Those people are the ones who needed advocacy. Not the whiners of today.

Love the way she sums it up: “Slavery, in fact, was not good”. If all Americans had had the basic humanity to make that admission after the fact, based on the clear evidence, as this woman did, the way forward would have been much easier for everyone. Revisionists, all the way forward even to current Florida governor Desantis, try to make the case for slavery having been a good thing for both parties and by doing so just prolong the pain and enmity and hold their society back from evolving to a better place. This woman shows that to be oh so evident and crystal clear.

Aren't there slaves today?

the only way to overcome this dark history is to face the harsh realities of what happened- and not bury the facts under political litigation

What's crazy is that there's more people in slavery today then any other time in history. This should definitely be played. We should study history, not rewrite it or erase it.

This is a great historical video and is definitely exactly what should be taught in school:actual history Pretty brutal by todays standards and you need to be forced to see it

There are more slaves in the world today than in 1850. They're just not in America.

Nice! keep em coming the southern border broadcast is the best and current never ending topic - love it!

The first story about the woman who would only be able to raise her children for the first two years of their life before they were taken away from her and sold literally made me sick to my stomach. As a mother, the thought of someone taking my babies away from me is too much to bare, I literally can't handle the thought of something bad happening to my child. The thought of them being taken from me and sold into slavery? Absolutely unfathomable. My heart breaks for that poor woman and her innocent babies, and for all the other women who experienced anything similar.

i wish people would stop saying that Americans were never taught the truth about slavery, we all were. This is a good example.

“And they’re farming babies, while slaves are out working.” Chris Cornell

The Mom's of 🗽 group would definitely report a teacher for sharing this! They have said it makes their children feel bad. Also some books refer to slaves as just workers now. They want to teach that they learned a lot of valuable skills lol. Their stories and lives are important to share and learn about. ❤

Great excerpts.

The term slave has its origins in the word slav. The slavs, who inhabited a large part of Eastern Europe, were taken as slaves by the Muslims of Spain during the ninth century AD. Slavery can broadly be described as the ownership, buying and selling of human beings for the purpose of forced and unpaid labour.

I think you can play this in school. Just as long as you remind them that during the time of the American slave trade that white people were also enslaved. Also, that all throughout history every race, color, and creed have been slaves at some point. The word slave was 1st used to for the white Slavic people that were captured and traded. If we teach them actual history and not the one that makes it seem that black people were the only ones ever enslaved, go for it. One more point. White Europeans did not go into Africa and capture black folks from their villages. Their own people captured each other during wars and territorial battles, and sold them to the whites on the coasts of Africa. If you want the real history of African slavery go read Thomas Sowell and he'll enlighten you on some harsh truths that schools will never teach.

Music is the language of the soul. The American African music (Blues and jazz) and native African music show opposite souls. Blue and jazz are sad, chaotic, screaming and complicated. Native African folk and tribal music are simple, grounding, peaceful and childlike. When I first came to the US, I could not listen to either Blues or jazz. They gave me an impression of someone being torn to pieces. It is a little better now. Like after being in a stinky room for a while, the bad smell seems to go away. Actually, it is still around, just the sense has become dull. I like native Africans and have encountered a few. They are peaceful, grounded, warm and childlike. The African Americans I encountered are different stories. I am very sad for what they went through. They have changed, there is no going back.

Slavery is such a sensitive topic in modern day. It’s refreshing to hear about it in a purely educational, historic, and non political light.

Yes, show this in schools and tell children that slavery still exists in other parts of the world.

Love the very clear, should be obvious statement at the end. ‘Slavery, as a matter of fact, was not good.’ It’s important to say.

I really like how she knows exactly who her audience is, and knows exactly how little to give a damn regarding their expectations.

*CLICKBAIT.* I expected to hear "real slaves speak to us from the 1930s".

We don't need to listen to slaves from the 1930s. There are 15 million slaves in Africa today! And an estimated 30 million slaves elsewhere in the world. We need to be listening to and freeing them. Oh I forgot, it's not about slavery.

Screw trigger warnings; people need to learn about the brutal realities of history so that it may never again repeat itself. When something is presented in a raw, unfiltered format, it seems far more authentic, and is more likely to stick with us for the rest of our lives; it's so much more personal.