Toole

About the Book

When Toole reached age fifteen, he had a revelation: he was a slave and would be one until he died – unless he ran away. He knew the chances of making it to freedom were slim, but he also knew the Ohio River and the Ohio school for freedmen he’d heard about were little more than fifty miles away. There was little to lose, really, and a whole new life to gain if he could make it to Ohio. He made up his mind to flee the Kentucky farm where work and indignities grew harder each day to bear. The night he prepared to leave, the woman who had raised him begged him to take her youngest child Tad with him to freedom. The child was bright and as yet unblemished by the taint of slavery. Toole was appalled at the idea of taking care of a seven-year-old on what was surely to be a harrowing journey. But what could he do? The woman had taken care of him when no one else would, when his own parents had been sold away from the farm, never to be heard from again. Within twelve hours, Toole and Tad were on their way to Ohio.

Neither knew for sure where they were headed or what awaited them. Their meager preparations for escape soon proved inadequate. The dangers from the winter weather, from slave catchers always on the prowl for runaways, and even from other unsympathetic slaves impeded their flight. Their lives were put into even greater jeopardy when a slave trader on the hunt for another runaway began pursuing them as well. Only the ingenuity and experience of Underground Railroad conductors who risked so much themselves got the runaways past first one obstacle then another.

The “conductors” were of all kinds: some were dedicated to a cause they felt was God’s work to free fellow human beings from the travails of slavery; some felt bound by their religion or morals to simply do what was “right.” Then there were those who found thrilling the dangers and excitement of aiding fugitives to elude crafty and vicious slavers. Toole and Tad met all kinds as they made their way from Kentucky to sanctuary in Ohio.

About the Author

Jane L. Ball is a former college English/humanities professor living in Yellow Springs, Ohio, with her husband. Her other publications include articles in The Humanist, Dictionary of Literary Biography, Beacham’s Popular Fiction, and many other publications. Her books include a college teacher’s manual, A Flea in Your Ear; a history of Wilberforce University, After the Split; and her first novel, Arrigo, a historical novel about an 18th century would-be castrato. She is currently working on her third novel.