The Life and Times of John Brown

Was John Brown a hero or terrorist? The answer is not so simple. In this documentary, Mr. Beat examines the life and times of the most (in)famous abolitionist in history.

I recently had the opportunity to stand on John Brown's nose:    • I stood on John Brown's nose  

Check out the book John Brown, Abolitionist: The Man Who Killed Slavery, Sparked the Civil War, and Seeded Civil Rights https://amzn.to/2XR0FY6

A special thanks to Grady Atwater for letting me interview him. I'd argue Atwater is one the world's leading experts on John Brown. Also, a special thanks to John Crow, a student of mine who colored the opening picture of Brown.

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Produced by Matt Beat. All images by Matt Beat, found in the public domain, or used under fair use guidelines. Music: "New Moon" by Bad Snacks and "The Fires" by Otis McDonald.

Photo credits/creative commons:
Mobilus In Mobili
Lcm1863
Tony Fischer
Mwanner | Talk

Sources/further reading:
https://www.vmi.edu/archives/stonewal...
https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/john-...
http://www2.iath.virginia.edu/jbrown/...
https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/flore...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Br...)
https://www.americanheritage.com/fath...
https://www.famous-trials.com/johnbro...
https://ohiohistorycentral.org/w/John...
https://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs...
http://www.wvculture.org/history/jbex...
http://www.wvculture.org/history/jbex...
Fire From the Midst of You: A Religious Life of John Brown by Louis A. DeCaro (2002)
Brown, Justus Newton (September–October 1916). "Lovejoy's Influence on John Brown". Magazine of History with Notes and Queries. 23 (3–4). pp. 97–102.
Great video about the Battle of Black Jack:
   • Introduction to the Battle of Black Jack  

John Brown was born in Torrington, Connecticut on May 9, 1800. His parents, Owen and Ruth Brown. He was the fourth one born of their eight kids.

No, he didn’t look like that when he was a baby. No one knows what he looked like when he was a baby, silly.

Brown’s family moved around a lot when he was a kid, but he spent most of his youth in Ohio. He had a very religious upbringing. Owen and Ruth also raised John to absolutely hate slavery. At 16 years old, he left his family and went to Plainfield, Massachusetts, where he studied to become a Congregationalist minister. Ultimately, though, Brown went into the same business as his dad. He raised cattle and worked as a tanner. You know, making leather from animal skins. At one point he was also a surveyor. You know, checking out the land and stuff.

In 1820, he married Dianthe Lusk. The couple eventually had 7 children together, and ended up settling in New Richmond, Pennsylvania. This is what’s left of the tannery John Brown ran while living there. Between 1825 and 1835, the tannery was an important stop on the Underground Railroad. No it wasn’t an actual railroad, you silly goose. The Underground Railroad was just what they called the secret network of routes and safe houses used to aid runaway slaves. It’s estimated that Brown helped more than 2,500 slaves at that tannery.

The 1830s didn’t begin so well for Brown. In 1831, his 4-year old son Frederick died. Brown himself got really sick and his businesses struggled, causing him to get in big debt. The next year, Dianthe died while giving birth to an unnamed son who also died shortly afterward. Clearly, this was a low point in Brown’s life, but he soon met someone new...Mary Ann Day. She was 16. He was 32. They married on June 14, 1833. Eventually, they had 13 more kids together, although only six of them made it to adulthood.

In 1836, the Browns moved to what is now Kent, Ohio. The next year, after a pro-slavery mob murdered the influential abolitionist Elijah Parish Lovejoy, Brown stood up in the back of a church and said “Here, before God, in the presence of these witnesses, from this time, I consecrate my life to the destruction of slavery.”

Meanwhile, in Ohio he had attempted again to operate a tannery, but struggled to make money from it. By 1839, he was again heavily in debt, and ended up losing his farm and getting arrested when he refused to give it up to its new owner.

#johnbrown #apush #americanhistory