All copies of this title, including those transferred to portable devices and other media, must be deleted/destroyed at the end of the lending period.
Description
In 2001, at forty-seven, Thomas DeWolf was astounded to discover that he was related to the most successful slave-trading family in American history, responsible for transporting at least 10,000 Africans to the Americas. His infamous ancestor, U.S. senator James DeWolf of Bristol, Rhode Island, curried favor with President Jefferson to continue in the trade after it was outlawed. When James DeWolf died in 1837, he was the second-richest man in America.
When Katrina Browne, Thomas DeWolf's cousin, learned about their family's history, she resolved to confront it head-on, producing and directing a documentary feature film, Traces of the Trade: A Story from the Deep North.
Inheriting the Trade is Tom DeWolf's powerful and disarmingly honest memoir of the journey in which ten family members retraced the steps of their ancestors and uncovered the hidden history of New England and the other northern states.
Their journey through the notorious Triangle Trade - from New England to West Africa to Cuba - proved life-altering, forcing DeWolf to face the horrors of slavery directly for the first time. It also inspired him to contend with the complicated legacy that continues to affect black and white Americans, Africans, and Cubans today.
Inheriting the Trade reveals that the North's involvement in slavery was as common as the South's. Not only were black people enslaved in the North for over two hundred years, but the vast majority of all slave trading in America was done by northerners. Remarkably, half of all North American voyages involved in the slave trade originated in Rhode Island, and all the northern states benefited.
With searing candor, DeWolf tackles both the internal and external challenges of his journey - writing frankly about feelings of shame, white male privilege, the complicity of churches, America's historic amnesia regarding slavery - and our nation's desperate need for healing. An urgent call for meaningful and honest dialogue, Inheriting the Trade illuminates a path toward a more hopeful future and provides a persuasive argument that the legacy of slavery isn't merely a southern issue but an enduring American one.
"Tom DeWolf's deeply personal story, of his own journey as well as his family's, is required reading for anyone interested in reconciliation. Healing from our historic wounds, which continue to separate us, requires us to walk this road together." - Myrlie Evers-Williams, civil rights leader, chairman emeritus of the NAACP (1995-98), and author of The Autobiography of Medgar Evers, Watch Me Fly, and For Us, the Living
"Inheriting the Trade is like a slow-motion mash-up, a first-person view from within one of the country's founding families as it splinters, then puts itself back together again." - Edward Ball, author of Slaves in the Family
Reviews
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When a cousin decided to make a documentary about the DeWolf family's slave-trading past, Thomas Norman DeWolf joined several family members on a journey to retrace the routes of his family's slave ships from Ghana to Cuba and the United States. DeWolf's voice reflects his admitted na•veté--at times too much so--as he discusses his growing awareness and shame over ancestor James DeWolf's role in the Triangle Trade. The author's descriptions of the places and history he discovered along the journey are powerful, and the topic is both compelling and important. However, the personal angle--the making of the documentary and the family discussions--distracts at times from the listener's understanding of and coming to terms with the horrors of the slave trade. J.A.S. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine
About the Author
Thomas Norman DeWolf served on the Oregon Arts Commission for nine years and as a local elected official for eleven. His years of public service focused on the arts, literacy, children's issues, and restorative justice. Tom and his wife, Lindi, live in Oregon.
