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Weathervane Newsletter Spring 2003
Rare Copy of Slave Narrative on Display
A rare copy of the Narrative of Sojourner Truth, A Northern Slave, Emancipated From Bodily Servitude. is now on display at Historic Northampton Museum & Education Center. Sojourner Truth, a former slave who became an abolitionist and feminist activist before the Civil War, conceived of the book while a member of the Northampton Association for Education and Industry- a utopian community organized around a communally operated silk mill.
Proceeds from the sale of the Narrative, enabled Sojourner Truth to purchase a house in Northampton. After the Northampton Association dissolved in 1846, Truth lived with former community members, but longed for her own home. She dictated her autobiography to Olive Gilbert and acted as her own publisher, distributor and bookseller. The first edition, printed in 1850, sold for 25 cents per copy. That year, Truth purchased a house on Park Street with a $300 mortgage from Samuel L. Hill. Hill had acquired the association's property to sell to former members. By 1854, Truth discharged the mortgage and lived there until 1857.
Contents Historic Northampton.