The Lost History of Frederick Douglass, Horsemanship and Horse Racing (virtual, July 12, 2022 @ 7PM)

Thursday, July 12, 2022 @ 7PM

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Learn about the lost history of Frederick Douglass as a horseman and his enthusiasm for horse racing in this groundbreaking presentation.

From his adolescence to his twilight years, Frederick Douglass was a respected horseman in his private and public life. Learn about the connections of Frederick Douglass to horse racing in Maryland, Washington, D.C. and elsewhere, as well as his relationships with historical figures in the horse racing industry.

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John Muller, author of Frederick Douglass in Washington, D.C.: The Lion of Anacostia and Mark Twain in Washington, D.C.: The Adventures of a Capital Correspondent, has presented widely throughout the DC-Baltimore metropolitan area at venues including the Enoch Pratt Free Library, Library of Congress, DC Public Library, Newseum, Politics and Prose, American Library in Paris and local universities.

He is currently working on a book about the lost history of Frederick Douglass on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Muller has been featured on C-SPAN’s BookTV and C-SPAN’s American History TV, as well on the airwaves of NBC4, WBAL-TV, WPFW, WJLA, WMAR-2, WAMU, WYPR, WEAA, and Delmarva Public Radio.

TICKETS * HERE *

VIDEO: Caiden’s 4th Grade History Project as Frederick Douglass

DC Premier of “THE VISIT” – Saturday, June 11, 2022 in Washington, D.C.

THE VISIT

DC PREMIERE SCREENING

SATURDAY, JUNE 11
6:30-9:30PM

EATON CINEMA, WASHINGTON DC
1201 K Street NW

ABOUT THIS FILM

In this fictional, historical-drama, written and directed by Paul Grant, a world-weary, young FREDERICK DOUGLASS (DL HOPKINS) get a surprise visit from HARRIET TUBMAN (SHALANDIS WHEELER SMITH) that alters the course of his personal life at a pivotal moment in U.S. History, just before The Civil War.

(Total Run Time: 22 Minutes)

RECEPTION & DISCUSSION AT 7:30PM
— TICKETS HERE —

Brief Note of Speculation: Was Frederick Douglass descended from a “Potomac Indian”?

I was recently searching through twitter and came across a thread where the potential “Indian” ancestry of Frederick Douglass was discussed.

In the thread a claim by the late Master Historian and Douglassonian biographer Dickson J. Preston that “a substantial body of evidence suggests that Douglass was part Indian” was cited, although not further discussed.

Over the years I’ve had occasion to review Preston’s handwritten note cards, which include unpublished notes and investigations to substantiate his claim of a “substantial body of evidence.”

Douglass reportedly told Caroline Dall he was descended from a “Potomac Indian.”

While Frederick Douglass, by his own admission, says that Captain Aaron Anthony referred to him as an “Indian,” and from time to time Douglass was mistaken for “one of the noble red men of the far West” (Life and Times, 1881, p. 563), there are also intrafamily correspondence over the years where the potential Native American ancestry of Douglass is discussed.

Furthermore, there are several accounts of Douglass discussing and/or mentioning his potential “Indian” heritage to close friends and associates.

However direct or distant the ancestral lineage of Frederick Douglass to Native Americans may have been, it is no question that Douglass identified and lived his life as a “Black American.”

Denton Journal. May 5, 1900. p. 2.

The questions into the ancestry and lineage of Douglass existed and abound in his own life. Douglass was a genealogist in his own right, working into the last year of his life to track down, and confirm, members of his family, as well as attempting to determine who his biological father was.

Speculation into the ancestral origins of Frederick Douglass, and his wife Anna Murray Douglass and their children, included in their own lifetime two former Maryland governors, Aaron Anthony, Hugh Auld and even John C. Calhoun, which Douglass politely refuted.

The complicated, intricate and even unknown dynamics of the genesis of Frederick (Bailey) Douglass is of continuous interest and intrigue to genealogists and historians because it allows for a better understanding and three-dimensional historical narrative instead of the singular tale of mythomathes that offer “meh” instead of citations.

JHM