The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1917-02-14
Centenary of
 Frederick Douglass

l Frederick Douglass, perhaps the 1 in Tuckahoe, Md, just a century ago | this month, and, while the exact date of his birth is not definitely known, i the fourteenth of February is gener ally celebrated by the negroes as the
 birthday of their greatest orator and journalist. As the main feature of the centenary celebration, the Fred erick Douglass Memorial and His torical Association was formed some years ago by the late Dr.. Booker Washington and oIrer prominent 1 IAfro-Americans, for the purpose or l buying the Douglass home at Ana coStia, D. C., and in other ways per- petuating the memory of the illus ! trious black man.
 Frederick Douglass had more white than negro blood in his veins his father being while man, while his
 mother, slave, was a mulatto. Tuck ahoe, the birthplace of Douglass, is in Caroline county, near the Delaware boundary line. Born in February, 1877, he was reared as a slave on the plantation of Col. Edward Lloyd, un- til at the age of ten he was sent to Baltimore to live with 8, relative of his owner. The boy secretly learned to read and write, and early displayed
 natural talent as an orator. For some time he was employed in Baltimore
 shipyard, but at the age of twenty one he was able to put into effect his long cherished design of escaping from slavery. He made his way to New York sand thence to New Bedford, where he supported himself for a Tn 10
 negro attended an anti-slavery meet
 ing at Nantucket, and this was the
 turning point in his career. He made
 a speech which so impressed his hear
 CTS that at the close fthe meeting
 he was offered and accepted the posi-
 ton of agent of the Massachusetts Ant1-SlaVery Society. In this capacity
 he spent four years in featuring in various parts of New England.
 The publication of his autobio-
 graphy in 1845 gave Douglass an in-
 ternational reputation, and he went
 to England and lectured in nearly all
 the cities of Great Britain and Ire
 land, receiving a most flattering re- ception. His friends in England rais- ed $750 to buy him from his Mary
 land claimant, and he was regularly
 manumitted. Upon returning to the
 United States in 1S47 Douglass set
 tied in Rochester and began the pub
 lication of Frederick Doug1ass's Pa
 per, weekly anti-slavery journal
 which quickly gained a large circula-
 ton among abolitionists. In 1859
 Douglass was accused of complicity
 in John Browns raid, and, on the
 advice of friends, fled to England. On
 his return to America at the outbreak
 of the civil war he raised two regi-
 ments of negro troops. After the war
 he settled in Washington as the edi-
 tor of the New National Era, and
 was appointed by President Grant a
 member of the commission to Santo
 Domingo. and later held office in the District of Columbia as United States
 marshal and recorder of deeds From 1889 to 1891 he was United States minister to Haiti. Douglass died in Washington in 1895.
 In practical work for his race Douglass was inferior to the late Dr. Booker Washington, while as a writ CT and thinker he is not to be classed with Dr. w. B. Burghardt Du Bois,
 who stands as the intellectual giant
 of the negro race; but Douglass's gift of oratory and general ability. to- gether withs the great part he played in encouraging anti-slavery sentiment. have made him the great hero of his people.