February 7: Frederick Douglass

Frederick Baily was born FEBRUARY 7, 1817. Though against the law for a slave, he learned to read. At age 20, he escaped to Massachusetts and changed his name to Frederick Douglass to hide from slave catchers.

He began debating, developing oratory skills and exposing the injustices of slavery. William Lloyd Garrison hired him to sell subscriptions to The Liberator Newspaper. Frederick Douglass published his best-selling autobiography, but with his identity now known, he had to flee to England to avoid slave-catchers.

He was enthusiastically received and met with reformer Daniel O'Connell. English friends raised money to buy his freedom and he returned to New York, founding the North Star Newspaper. Writing for abolition and women's suffrage, his motto was "Right is of no sex-Truth is of no color-God is the Father of us all, and we are all Brethren."

An advisor to President Lincoln, Frederick Douglass told the story of his conversion: "I loved all mankind, slaveholder not excepted, though I abhorred slavery more than ever. I saw the world in a new light...I gathered scattered pages of the Bible from the filthy street gutters, and washed and dried them, that...I might get a word or two of wisdom from them."

American Minute with Bill Federer