AUBURN, N.Y. (AP) - A New York college professor will give a talk on the 19th-century memoir “12 Years a Slave” at an upstate museum linked to Solomon Northup’s story of enslavement and eventual freedom.
Richard Newman, professor of African-American history at the Rochester Institute of Technology, will give his talk Wednesday night at the Seward House Historic Museum in Auburn.
Museum officials tell The Citizen of Auburn (https://bit.ly/QrsPVe ) that the Seward House and the Finger Lakes city have a direct connection to the slave memoir that was the basis for the Oscar-winning film of the same title.
Then-New York Gov. William H. Seward signed the 1840 legislation that allowed agents to reclaim the kidnapped Northup from slavery on a Louisiana plantation. Northup later detailed his ordeal in “12 Years a Slave,” first published in Auburn in 1853.
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Information from: The Citizen, https://www.auburnpub.com
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