Under New York’s 1799 Gradual Abolition scheme, a child born to an enslaved mother (as of a certain date) was deemed “free,” but had to continue as the servant of the mother’s owner until the age of 25 (for a girl) or 28 (for a boy).  Gronningsater develops a deeply researched picture of the lives, politics, and legal efforts of this generation of Black children of ambiguous status, and how they combined with others to help shape important changes to the U.S. Constitution as well as groundbreaking state and Federal civil rights legislation.  

Gronningsater is a historian of the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century United States at the University of Pennsylvania; she has won multiple academic prizes and citations, and awards for excellence in teaching, notably Richard S. Dunn Award for Distinguished Teaching, the Dean’s Award for Distinguished Teaching and the Penn Friars Senior Society Faculty Award.

Pre-talk reception at 6:30pm.