A Right to the Rails: America's First Freedom Rider

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Simply go to geico.com or contact your local agent today. This is Lee Habib and this is Our American Stories, the show where America is the star and the American people. And to search for the Our American Stories podcast, go to the I Heart radio app, the Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Most people know the story of Rosa Parks, but few know about an incident that took place in New York City when a woman by the name of Elizabeth Jennings brought about change nearly 100 years before Rosa Parks, reconstruction and the Civil War. Here to tell the story is Jerry Micarenda, author of America's First Freedom Rider. Take it away, Jerry. On Sunday, July 16, 1854, Elizabeth and her friend Sarah Adams took a Chatham Street horse car bound for church when they refused to leave because they were black to conduct her assaulted and threw her off.

The question I asked myself was very, very simple. What drove a battered Elizabeth Jennings to get back off the ground and charge back onto that horse car? And I really feel that the answer lie in what Frederick Douglass eventually called her good New York stock of strong family values. Those strong family values really start by her father, Thomas L. Jennings.

He's eulogized by Frederick Douglass in a 900-word obituary that he writes himself, just to show you how important her father really was. In the early 1820s, Jennings owns one of the largest towering houses in New York City, and he begins experimenting with chemicals to clean fabrics. And in 1821, he's granted a patent for the process of dry scouring clothes. And in short, he ends up inventing a precursor of dry cleaning, and it revolutionizes the clothing business. He ends up getting this patent signed by John Quincy Adams, and the letters of patent prove that a black man can actually have a patent in this country.

It's hard for us to really believe how much that meant to people back in those days. And the most interesting thing, though, about that is her father gets the patent, and of course, in those days, being a merchant and a tailor was really a competitive business. So another tailor named Abraham Cox decides, hey, I'm going to say that this is my invention. So Cox goes around and starts putting all these what they call placards or advertisements around the country, saying, come to my tailoring shop, and I'll clean your clothes.

I'll use this new scouring method. Well, Jennings never wanted to back down from a fight. Doesn't run away or try to get away from this guy. He moves his tailoring business right next to where Cox is on Nassau Street, and the two of them are going at it all the summer of 1821. And Cox finally starts to vandalize Jennings' shop, and he throws oil of victory, all the acid all over his gold leaf sign in the front of his building. And Jennings says, I had it. I'm bringing you to court. So November 29, 1821, in the Marine Court in lower Manhattan, Jennings has a suit against Cox.

They're going back and forth during this trial, which was written up in the local papers. And Jennings, at a pivotal moment of the trial, stands up and says, look, and he holds up his framed letters of patent signed by John Quincy Adams and says, look, this is my invention. I own the rights in the world.

This guy is stealing it from me. Well, the old white jury goes out, and they come back pretty quickly, and they find unanimously for Jennings, and they give him $50. And so I think that that case really sets the tone for the family to say, look, we are citizens of this country just like everybody else. We will not be denied our rights. And when we have our rights violated, we will go use the legal system of the US, just like any other citizen, to make sure that we get restitution and that we're treated like everybody else.

We are equal citizens. And so I think that's really implanted deeply with the family. And when you branch out from the father, Elizabeth learns quite a bit from her mother as well. Her mother was one of the founding members of a group called the Ladies' Literary Society of New York City. And back in the 1820s and 30s, women were not able to partake in public life the way women are today. If they wanted to raise money or support a cause, they had to do it passively by just raising the money and then giving it to a male-run organization so they could decide how to spend it. But these literary societies also have another uptake to them in that women who were not really given an equal opportunity to go to school and learn how to read and write in those days, these groups of women learned to teach each other how to read and write.

So that's why they call them literary societies. And they had meetings where women would stand up, they would learn how to write an essay, and they would read it to their fellow members and get feedback and talk about the issues. You know, what are the issues about slavery?

What about our rights to vote? And one of the huge things that Elizabeth's mother's group and other African American, even in the white literary societies, is they had petitions to stop slavery in the nation's capital. And these women went door to door, which was pretty dangerous in those times. I mean, if a woman was found after dusk out on the streets of New York City, she was arrested as a prostitute. It didn't matter who she was. And there's cases of very famous rich women just happening to accidentally and spending days in jail. And there was no habeas corpus.

Nobody had to tell you who was there and how long they were going to be in jail. So by going out and doing these petitions, they were taking risks and they would go out in groups. And by 1836, millions of these petitions land in Congress and Congress finally says, we've had it, we don't want any more of these, we get the message. So even without having a voice in politics, women were having their presence felt long before they had to vote. And one of the crowning moments of this group that Elizabeth's mother is part of, along with her two sisters, Matilda and Sarah, when Elizabeth's a very young girl, she ends up being the youngest in the family, is in 1837 they hold what they call a mental feast for the Colored American Newspaper, which is the newspaper of record for African Americans.

Few people know that the very first African American newspapers started in New York City. So this mental feast, these women invite men in to hear all of the different things that they're doing and working on. And of course, in these days, if a group of men and women got together and intermingled, it would have been considered scandalous, if not promiscuous and beyond the pale, as they used to say. So the men are in the Kordendorf area and they see various skits that they put on. And in one of the speeches, Elizabeth's mother gets up and she reads a short speech about, you know, 500 words. So it's called On the Improvement of the Mind. And if you read it, it reads as true today as it did almost 200 years ago. And it's all about how, through education, is how we will be able to improve ourselves and become equals. And this thing goes on for a good day. They raise a lot of money. And the following year, some of that money goes to a couple who are escaping through the Underground Railroad and the couple turns out to be Frederick Douglass and his wife, Anna.

And that's something I don't think that he ever forgot. And when we come back, more of this remarkable story, the story of race trailblazer Elizabeth Jennings, here on Our American Story. Folks, if you love the stories we tell about this great country and especially the stories of America's rich past, know that all of our stories about American history, from war to innovation, culture and faith, are brought to us by the great folks at Hillsdale College, a place where students study all the things that are beautiful in life and all the things that are good in life. And if you can't get to Hillsdale, Hillsdale will come to you with their free and terrific online courses.

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There's a better way to fly private. And we return to Our American Stories and the story of America's first freedom writer, Elizabeth Jennings, with author Jerry Micarenda. When we last left off, Jerry was telling us about Elizabeth's family. Her father, Thomas L. Jennings, was the first African American to hold a patent in 1821.

Using the money he received from his patent, an early form of dry cleaning, he was able to buy freedom for his enslaved family. Elizabeth's mother, Elizabeth Cartwright, was also an important woman in her own right, being an important member in an organization that helped Frederick Douglass escape slavery. Let's get back to the story.

Here again is Jerry Micarenda. The mother and father are setting a great example for their children. She herself decides, you know, I'm going to break the mold as well. And she decides to become a teacher at a time when it's mostly a male-dominated business. And also, she plays the organ. Now, church organists were mostly all male, and certainly choir leaders were all male. But she breaks the mold once again, and she becomes a choir leader.

For the Second Congregational Church over on Second Avenue, quite a long walk from where she lives. That all leads up to the incident on July 16, 1854. During that time, the city was in the middle of a week-long heat wave.

The shipyards were shut down. People were collapsing from what they call brain fever at the time. Horses were dying in the streets.

Tempers were flaring. And here we have two young women rushing to get to church. They're already late.

It's going to take too long to walk, and it's too hot, really, to walk the almost two miles to the Second Avenue church. And they decide they're going to hail down a horse car. And they see one way in the distance. It's a four-mile-an-hour world back then. And if you could go four miles an hour in a horse car, you'd consider yourself pretty lucky. And so they're waiting and waiting, and this car finally pulls up. It's a light green car.

It probably carries about 24 passengers, but there's maybe only 10 people in there on an early, very hot Sunday. And they start to get on. They're about to sit down, and the conductor comes over and sees who they are and says, You've got to wait for the next car. And he's pointing out in the street, and they look, and they don't see anything. And Elizabeth says, Look, we're in...

I'm just paraphrasing from what she said. Look, we're in a hurry. I need to get to church. You know, we don't have time to keep waiting for other cars, what have you. And she looks around the car, and she sees there are plenty of seats anyway. But the next car is ready for your people, and she says, I have no people. And the conductor then turns around to her and says, Your people are... You're waiting for the colored car. You're not going to ride in this car, basically. And so they go back and forth, and she says, Well, look, I'm not getting off this car.

I need to get to church. If you want me to wait for that car, I'm going to wait for it right here. So they're holding up the car. They won't get off, and the conductor's now starting to get really agitated.

So it's kind of a standoff between the two young women and this conductor. The driver's there trying to hold his horses. Everybody in the car is starting to look at their watches and what have you.

They're sitting there in this silence, in the heat. And then finally, they see this car coming in the distance, just like they saw the last one. And when it gets close enough, there's a sign on the front of it that says, Colored people allowed in this car. And Elizabeth yells over to them, Is there room in your car? And the driver says, No, there's more room in your car, but there's no room here. So they then turn back to the conductor and say, Well, you know, there's your answer. We can't get in that car.

We need to get to where we're going. And the driver says to them, You can go in. Sit down, but let me tell you something. Cause any trouble. Act up.

Do anything like that. I'm throwing you right out of this car. And by this time, Elizabeth has it. Between the heat, the discrimination, and the annoyance of what's going on, she finally stands up to him and says, I'm a respectable person. I was born and raised in New York.

I've never been insulted while going to church. And he just charges right back and says, Well, I was born in Ireland. I don't care where you were born. I'm throwing you out of this car now.

You talk back to me, you're going out. So Elizabeth finally tells him, Look, it makes no difference where a man was born. He's no better or worse for that, provided he behaves himself. But you're a no good for nothing and prudent fellow who insults genteel people on their way to church. And then he says, All right, that's it.

I'm throwing you out. She tells him not to lay a hand on her. And they actually get in a battle. Elizabeth grabs a hold of a window sash and she's a pretty tough character. He's not able to pull her off. And so he yells for the driver to come and help him. So the driver ties up the horses, comes back. They both pull her off. And she's now at the top of the stairs of this horse car, which may be, you know, three or four feet above the ground level. And they throw her off. She's laying on the ground where her friend, Sarah, has already been pushed off. And Sarah is screaming, Don't murder her. She's being murdered.

Somebody help us. And finally, Elizabeth just laying there on a cobblestone. She's bleeding and bruised. And she finally stands up and they're getting ready.

They kind of clean their hands off and say, Well, that's it. Goodbye. And Elizabeth just runs back onto the horse car. She's not going to be denied this ride. She's not going to be held back from where she wants to go. And the conductor's shocked.

And he yells at her, You'll sweat for this. The horse car takes off and he's holding her there pressed back against the wall and tells the rider to lash the horses and run until you see a policeman or a police station. The car takes off recklessly up Walker Street. And, of course, with these railed horse cars, you have to worry about them jumping the rail. They jump the rails.

I mean, people get killed. So this is really reckless on the part of both the conductor and the driver. And they finally get to around Walker Street and they see a policeman out on the street. They stop the car and the policeman goes over and says, All right, what's the problem there? The conductor says, Well, you know, this woman got on the car.

You know, I don't think anybody really wanted it on here. And so the cop comes on and he says, Does anybody object to her being on this car? And nobody raises their hand. They're just looking down. You can tell people are hot and sweating. They just want to get to where they're going.

Nobody complains. And finally the policeman pushes her off and says, Look, get off of this car. You don't belong on this car. And he starts poking her with his, I guess you would call a billy club today. He finally pushes her off and says, Look, don't cause any trouble.

Don't think you can start. Don't go back and start a riot because we, you know, we'll find out who you are. And she says, I'll get redress for this. And the policeman laughs. Well, you know, see what you can do.

I doubt you'll be able to do anything. And she's dropped in the middle of nowhere on a Sunday on a deserted street where there is, I think, a place that sells coal. There's a lumber yard, a few other businesses that are now closed on a Sunday. But she finally gets home and she's so badly beaten that she's really not able to do anything. And the whole African American community is now enraged.

Like, Oh, my God, how could this happen to one of our best young professional people? People are saying, well, the church where she was supposed to be, they're going to hold a vigil for her on Monday night. But she's so beaten up, she can't even get out of bed. So she dictates a letter to her father explaining what happened in her own words. And the following night, her father goes to this church meeting, this vigil.

He reads her letter to the standing room only crowd and says, Look, what is it that we want out of this? And they said, First, we want this railroad to apologize for treating one of our upstanding young citizens as a criminal. Second, they should pay for her wounds because she's not going to be able to work now for quite a while.

She's really beaten and battered. And third, we're tired of being treated as second class citizens. We have the same rights as everybody else. We want our rights recognized to ride transit and get to work just like every other American. And so her father takes out ads in all these papers throughout New York and says, you know, we are going to fight this and we're going to fight it for everybody. Not just it's important that my daughter gets restitution, but it's more important that we get the right to ride public transportation settled once and for all.

And so he's really serious about this. Like I said, he puts this out on a number of newspapers across the state and they decide that they're going to have a lawsuit. The question is, who would take a lawsuit from an African-American woman against the powerful Third Avenue Railroad that in 1854 makes over a million dollars in nickel fares?

That's the real question that they have to answer next. And you're listening to a heck of a story being told by Jerry Micarenda. And it is the story of Elizabeth Jennings.

And what a scene, what a showdown on that horse car between two men and two women and two women dressed to go to church. Not exactly a wise move by the cops. They thought they were in the right, though. They thought they had the power and they thought they had the law on their side, too.

But Elizabeth's dad, well, he harnessed the power of the church, the power of the press. And when we come back, we're going to learn what happens next, the story of Elizabeth Jennings, the first freedom rider here on Our American Story. Where you can hunt for hidden treasures and unlock some adorable digital outfits. I'll be there, too. So be sure to say hi. Sign up now so you can join right in when Slipping Land goes live on Friday, November 11th. Check out paris.world.co today.

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There's a better way to fly private. And we're back with our American Stories. And the final portion of our story on Elizabeth Jennings. When we last left off, Elizabeth and her friend Sarah Adams had gotten onto a streetcar in New York City to go to church.

However, Elizabeth would be assaulted by the streetcar operators because of her refusal to leave the car over the color of her skin in defiance of its operator's slights against her. Elizabeth's father decided his family would sue, not just for Elizabeth, who had been beaten pretty badly, but for his entire community. Let's return to the story.

Here again is Jerry Micarenda. Her father understood how important this case was. It wasn't just a matter of getting money and restitution for his daughter's injuries. Those would heal.

He knew that. But what wouldn't heal is this prejudice against African Americans. And if you can't ride to work, then you're nobody in this country. So you have to be able to get to jobs.

You certainly have to be able to get from your home to really good jobs. So he understands that this is a really important right for the folks of New York City and New York State and the country to have. So he doesn't fool around and just hire a law firm that'll get him some money. He goes to the best civil rights, what we would call a civil rights firm today, which is Culver and Parker.

And the reason for that is Culver, Erasmus Culver, a lawyer from upstate New York and Vermont, ardent abolitionist his whole life, won the Lemming Slave case in New York City back in 1852, just a few years before. And I'm sure being on top of this situation, Thomas Jennings knew of him, knew of his law firm well. And he goes to Culver and they have discussions and Culver tells him, well, look, I'm becoming a judge so I'm not going to be able to take this case. And in all likelihood, Jennings probably couldn't even afford to have him take the case. But he does tell him, look, we just took on a new lawyer. He passed the bar in May and we think he could do well with this case.

This will be his first case, but we think he can win it. So they turn to a young Chester Arthur, just graduated from law school, and now he is ready for his first case. Arthur then does something very interesting and he takes advantage of the new court system in New York State. And back in 1847, New York State decided to redo its constitution. And part of that was creating what they called a unified court system, which meant the old circuit courts of a judge riding to town on a horse, setting up a table in the back of a saloon or in a barn and hearing different cases, that's all gone. New York State was now going to have a unified system where you went to courtrooms.

You felt like you were actually before a justice rather than some friend or somebody who came by every once in a while. So you were now able to, in New York State, bring a case in any court you want to. And so very smartly, young Arthur decides, well, I'm not going to try this case in New York, Manhattan, where it happened. I'm going to bring it to the Supreme Court in the second district, which is Brooklyn.

Of course, Brooklyn is a different city then. So he brings it there and the trial date is set for February 22nd, 1855. And of course, we all know what February 22nd is. George Washington's birthday. But as George Washington's birthday, they still held courts, but it was a much more raucous celebration in time. So the family gets ready.

They go to court. And of course, it being George Washington's birthday, there are celebrations going on all over the place. There are fife and drum bands. There are parades nonstop.

People are shooting off cannons and fireworks and firearms. The balconies and rotunda of the city hall are filled with people just stopping in and they find out that there's this trial going on where a black woman is suing the powerful Third Avenue Railroad. And people gather around and it's almost like watching a fight of David against Goliath.

And so the rafters are filled with people and are watching this trial as it goes on. And so the trial gets underway and the lawyers from the Third Avenue Railroad don't expect anything. They look at this as a slam dunk. And in fact, when the conductor and the driver get up, they plead no contest. They say, yeah, sorry, we did it. Probably shouldn't have.

We didn't mean it. And the railroad then stands up and says, look, these charges should be dismissed. These men have free will.

We have no control over them and that's it. And the judge at this point is inclined to agree with them. And he's getting ready to hit his gavel. And all of a sudden, Arthur, who was a very tall and slender young man at the time, stands up and says, Your Honor.

And he thrust his arm into the air, way high into the air. And he's holding this big, heavy book. He says, Your Honor, I hold here the statutes from 1824. And they show that public conveyances, they are reliable and responsible for the actions of their employees.

And Arthur gives the statutes to the judge Rockwell, who then gives his orders to the jury. And basically he says that the company was liable for the actions of their agents, whether committed carelessly, negligently or willfully or maliciously. That they were common carriers and as such bound to carry all respectable persons. That colored persons, if sober, well behaved and free of disease, had the same rights as others. And could neither be excluded by any rules of the company nor by force of violence.

And in case of such expulsion or exclusion, the company was liable. And with those orders, the jury goes out. And just like her father, all those years before, the old white jury comes back and says, Elizabeth has won her case. And she asks for about $500, which is a lot of money back in those days. They decide, as they say, for peculiar reasons, to cut it down to $225.

And the judge throws in another $25 to pay off Arthur's fees. And the place erupted. It was like the end of a Super Bowl or World Series. People were just cheering.

They couldn't believe that this happened. In fact, it was such a stunning victory that when Horace Greeley, the owner and editor at the Tribune hears this, he actually takes the notes from his reporter and he writes the article. He calls it a wholesome verdict. And he says from now on, African Americans will be treated just like everybody else. They have the same rights as everybody else to ride any transportation in this state, whether it's a ferry, a steamboat, a horse car, an omnibus. So it's a stunning victory. And right away, a number of the railroads, there are something like nine of them. Five of them say, yeah, we'll comply with this. But there are others that say, no, we'll fight it in court.

We won't do this until you force us to do it. Elizabeth carries on with her mother and living in the city. She gets married. She goes on and teaches, gets involved in a number of activities with her church.

And in 1875, Elizabeth started a women's missionary association at St. Phillips as a way to support churches in Haiti and Africa. So life goes on for Elizabeth and for Chester Arthur, who become head of the Custom House in New York City and eventually is put on the ticket with Garfield as vice president. And when Garfield is assassinated, he takes over as president. She ends up dying of Bright's disease, the same thing that Arthur did, by the way.

She's buried over with the family in Cypress Hills, then forgotten. So until now. And you've been listening to the story of America's first freedom writer, Elizabeth Jennings, and the freedom fighter, her father, who took the powerful railroad company all the way to the Supreme Court in Brooklyn. And the Supreme Court is actually an appellate court in New York.

The appellate court is the Supreme Court. That's New York. And by the way, a special thanks to Scott Levin for gathering the audio in the story and to Monty Montgomery for producing the piece. And what a story about the rule of law, which we talk about a lot here. And by the way, not always was our rule of law fairly applied or administered. And in this case, indeed, it was. With a whopping verdict back then, $250 was real money. And of course, legal fees were thrown in, too. We all got to know who Chester A. Arthur is and was because he became president.

But Elizabeth Jennings, well, she died unknown. And that's why we tell the stories we tell here at Our American Stories. Rule of law matters. It separates us from so many other countries around the world. And regrettably, the rule of law did not apply equally to all Americans.

It had to be fought for, for black Americans particularly. The story of Elizabeth Jennings, the first freedom writer, here on Our American Stories. I've seen Paris Hilton here with big news. I've created my very own 3D interactive world. Starting November 11th, come visit Paris Hilton's Slivingland. It's a place full of magic, fun, and surprises. Where you can hunt for hidden treasures and unlock some adorable digital outfits. I'll be there, too. So be sure to say hi. Sign up now so you can join right in when Slivingland goes live on Friday, November 11th.

Check out paris.world.co today. See you there. Do you want to win two tickets to the FIFA World Cup 2022 in Qatar? Frito-Lay is giving you the chance to make history by joining their Pass the Ball Challenge. Add your picture to the Golden World Soccer Ball.

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