15

HISTORICAL ANNOTATION 643

embracing not only scientific and literary topics but also inspirational lectures meant
to spur moral and social reform. During the latter half of the nineteenth century, commercial
entertainment rather than education became the primary focus of the movement.
Combining education with entertainment, Douglass 's lyceum oratory attempted
to forge a new American public sensibility, one that supported integration, equal
rights, and educational reform for the African American community. Angela G . Ray,
The Lyceum and Public Culture in the Nineteenth-Century United States (East
Lansing, Mich., 2005), 1-119.
7.19 Douglass' escape from Maryland] Douglass successfully fled slavery in
Baltimore, Maryland, on 3 September 1838, briefly seeking refuge first in New York
City, and soon thereafter in New Bedford, Massachusetts. McFeely, Frederick
Douglass, 71-74.
7.20 New Bedford] New Bedford, in Bristol County, Massachusetts, was one of
the world's leading whaling ports in the nineteenth century. The whaling industry and
related shipping operations boomed after the American Revolution and reached its
peak in the 1850s. Whale oil for lighting was the largest export, and in 1856, when a
new city hall was erected, the motto "Lucem Diffundo" (I Spread the Light) was
placed on its seal. Kathryn Grover, The Fugitive's Gibraltar: Escaping Slaves and
Abolitionism in New Bedford, Massachusetts (Amherst, Mass., 2001), 18-36; Saul
Cohen, ed., The Columbia Gazeteer of the World, 3 vols. (New York, 1998), 2:2153-
54; James M. Lindgren, "'Let Us Idealize Old Types of Manhood': The New Bedford
Whaling Museum, 1903-1941," NEQ, 72:163-206 (June 1999).
7.20 21 as a local Methodist preacher] In New Bedford. Douglass became a
leading member of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion church. In fact Douglass
spoke from the pulpit even before offering his first antislavery oratory in 1841. In My
Bondage and My Freedom, Douglass describes his association with the church, which
he joined after moving his family to New Bedford, noting that he was "soon made a
class leader and a local preacher." Although his second autobiography offers some
details, his full involvement with the New Bedford church is not widely known. In his
1887 memoir, African Methodist Episcopal Zion church minister Thomas James
recalled Douglass's activism in the New Bedford church in 1840. James took over the
pastorate of the New Bedford African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church that year, and
notes that he granted Douglass a license to preach. More details are provided by
Douglass in an 1894 letter to James W. Hood. Hood was researching a book about the
history of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion church in America and solicited
Douglass for his experiences with the New Bedford church. In his reply, Douglass
describes his activities with the African Methodist Episcopal Zion denomination as
beginning in 1838, soon alter his arrival in New Bedford. He wrote, "As early as
1839, I obtained a license from the Quarterly Conference as a local preacher, and
often occupied the pulpit by request of the preacher in charge." Douglass credits his
church activism as an important catalyst for his career as an antislavery activist, noting:
"I look back to the days I spent in little Zion, New Bedford, in the several capacities