Cohen, who is black, told her to get over it. It took months of research in the United States and Canada for Carbone to gather the details needed to piece the story together. She read everything slave narratives and letters, census and land records, and newspaper articles. She also tried to share Ann Maria s experience by wearing rags on her feet, sleeping on a cornhusk mattress, and traveling by train to Canada while sitting upright for 20 hours. Ann Maria and I both got into Canada using bogus documents, reflects Carbone.
Reenactment often turns more real than planned.
She also visited the inn and tavern in Unity, now privately owned, where Ann Maria s masters lived, and St. Mary s Catholic Church here in Rockville, where Ann Maria attended services. The book takes some literary license to make the story flow, but for the most part, it follows what actually happened as much as possible. Carbone s knowledge of the Underground Railroad gave her a brush with celebrity when she and others helped Oprah Winfrey reenact her role as a runaway slave in preparation for her film Beloved. So Oprah was blindfolded, changed into slave garb, and taken back into time through the Maryland woods. It was an emotional experience for everyone, says Carbone.