The NAACP and Its Architects

American Experience

History Series / 14 Seasons

American Experience, TV's most-watched history series, brings to life the compelling stories from our past that inform our understanding of the world today.

Watch Latest: S37 E2

53m

Garrison Introduces Douglass

2m 16s

William Lloyd Garrison speaks to a crowd of abolitionists in Nantucket, Massachusetts. He introduces the self-emancipated Frederick Douglass, soon leading to a powerful partnership with a common cause -- immediate abolition of slavery.

Burning Abolitionist Literature

1m 58s

The Anti-Slavery Society's great postal campaign of 1835 flooded the South with abolitionist literature. Instead of bringing about the end of slavery, it triggered a wave of repression. In Charleston, SC, 3,000 people gathered in Post Office square to destroy anti-slavery materials and burn Garrison in effigy.

Harriet Beecher Stowe Visits a Slave State

2m 21s

Having recently moved to Cincinnati with her family, Harriet Beecher visited the slave state of Kentucky in 1833, staying here at the Marshall Key House. While in Kentucky, she witnessed slavery up close for the first time. The house now operates as the Harriet Beecher Stowe, Slavery to Freedom Museum.

Angelina Grimke Goes Public

2m 59s

After reading reports of pro-slavery violence, Angelina Grimke decided she could remain silent no longer. She published a letter in "The Liberator" and wrote "An Appeal to the Women of the South," urging them to work for the downfall of slavery.

Frederick Douglass Begins to Understand Slavery

2m 10s

At six years old, Frederick Douglass had just begun his life as a slave when he witnessed his aunt get beaten brutally by her master. "It was the bloodstained gate, the entrance to the hell of slavery," he would later write.

Garrison Publishes "The Liberator"

2m 21s

William Lloyd Garrison published the first issue of "The Liberator" on January 1, 1831 with financial support from both black and white abolitionists. "There shall be no neutrals," he declared. "Men shall either like or dislike me."

Two Abolitionists Unite

2m 49s

Abolitionist activists Angelina Grimke and Theodore Weld declared their love for one another and got married in 1838. Both a black and a white minister officiated and mixed-race guests intermingled freely. News of the event caused a stir in Philadelphia.

The Burning of Pennsylvania Hall

1m 29s

Inside Pennsylvania Hall in 1838, an abolitionist meeting was disrupted when members of an anti-abolitionist mob threw rocks through the windows. The following night, the protestors set fire to the building -- completely destroying Philadelphia's monument to free speech.

Abolitionist Allies Fall Out

2m 54s

After the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850, the abolition of slavery takes on a new urgency for formerly enslaved people. Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison no longer see eye to eye, and they have a falling out. "Douglass has had that experience. Garrison is a white man in a white man's America."

Garrison Closes The Liberator

1m 17s

After four decades and 1,803 issues, William Lloyd Garrison closed The Liberator after the 13th Amendment was added to the constitution. He could continue to fight for equal rights, dying in 1879 at age 73.

Triumph

1m 59s

The day after Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox, Garrison was met by 10,000 freed slaves outside the Charleston Citadel. They seized him joyfully and carried him on their shoulders around the square before proceeding a few blocks to Zion's Church, where a mass of humanity pressed in to every available spot.

Failed Protests

2m 55s

In the Spring of 1854, fugitive slave Anthony Burns sat in Boston's city jail. Locals protesting for Burns' release turned violent before the U.S. President Franklin Pierce ordered hundreds of military troops to escort Burns to a ship waiting in the harbor. Though abolitionists were losing hope, they had shifted history.

A Powerful Partnership

2m 53s

In 1841 Frederick Douglass agreed to join forces with William Lloyd Garrison to advocate full time for the abolitionism of slavery. It is "an opportunity to strike a blow for the slaves who continue to suffer as we speak."

Douglass Publishes "The North Star"

2m 24s

In Rochester, New York, the last stop on the Underground Railroad, Frederick Douglass published abolitionist newspaper "The North Star," naming it after the icon followed by so many escaping slaves on their quest to freedom.

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