Secrets of Harriet Tubman’s life are being revealed 100 years later

More than a century after her death, historians are still unraveling the secrets of her life. This month the nation celebrates Harriet Tubman’s bicentennial and the fifth anniversary of the two national parks named after her. From film screenings and historical lectures to art exhibits and monument installations, here’s how you can uncover the mystery that shrouds Tubman’s life and honor the legacy of a woman who inspired generations.

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Family trees fill in the gaps for Black people seeking their ancestral roots

By Curtis Bunn, NBC News Black people have been able to connect with the past and give new agency to their identities through building family trees and researching their family histories. Growing up in Philadelphia, Amber Jackson said she knew so little of her history that she felt disconnected from who she was.  “They didn’t…

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We Still Can’t See American Slavery for What It Was

What is known about the Trans-Atlantic slave trade? We know a great deal about the scale of human trafficking across the Atlantic Ocean and about the people aboard each ship. Much of that research is available to the public in the form of the SlaveVoyages database. A detailed repository of information on individual ships, individual voyages and even individual people, it is a groundbreaking tool for scholars of slavery, the slave trade and the Atlantic world. And it continues to grow. Last year, the team behind SlaveVoyages introduced a new data set with information.

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