The Hard Road to Ending Slavery in Maryland

WYPR - 88.1 FM Baltimore | By Sheilah Kast,

Published October 27, 2016 at 2:08 PM EDT

Twenty-eight fugitives escaping from the Eastern Shore of Maryland.

By the time Maryland got around to ending slavery, 152 years ago next week, the Confederacy was within months of collapsing, black people in the District of Columbia had been free more than two years and President Lincoln had declared emancipation in the South more than a year and a half earlier. What took Maryland so long? Historian C.R. Gibbs explains how Maryland’s elites split over what course to follow, how heroic fighting by black soldiers in the Union army affected public opinion, and, once a new state constitution to abolish slavery was put to referendum, how close the vote was.

Sheilah Kast

Sheilah Kast is the host of On The Record, Monday-Friday, 9:30-10:00 am. Originally, she hostedWYPR's Dupont-Columbia University award-winning Maryland Morning with Sheilah Kast from 2006 - October2015. She began her career at The Washington Star, where she covered the Maryland and Virginia legislatures, utilities, energy and taxes, as well as financial and banking regulation. She learned the craft of broadcasting at ABC News; as a Washington correspondent for fifteen years, she covered the White House, Congress, and the 1991 Moscow coup that signaled the end of the Soviet empire. Sheilahhas been a substitute host on NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday and The DianeRehmShow. She has launched and hosted two weekly interview shows on public TV, one about business and one about challenges facing older people.

See stories by Sheilah Kast

Andrea Appleton

Andrea Appleton is a producer for Midday. She comes to WYPR with years of experience as a freelance journalist filing stories for newspapers, magazines, and public radio. She has reported on topics ranging from bull riding to bionic fish, with an emphasis on science. She is also former senior editor of the Baltimore City Paper, and a graduate of the Columbia University School of Journalism.

See stories by Andrea Appleton