Frederick Douglass: Pathway from Slavery to Freedom tells the fascinating story of the young Douglass and his escape from the horrors of slavery at the age of 20 and became one of our nation's most influential abolitionists Few people achieve in a lifetime what young Frederick Douglass achieved by the age of 17. At the age of 8, Frederick Douglass's slave owner, Mrs. Auld, "very kindly commenced to teach me the A,B,Cs." But her husband soon found out and forbade his wife to instruct the young slave child who was so hungry for knowledge. This taught Douglass an essential lesson, "I now understand what had been to me a most perplexing difficulty--to wit, the white man's power to enslave the black man. From that moment, I understood the pathway from slavery to freedom...I set out with high hope at whatever cost of trouble to learn how to read." Lacking a formal teacher, Douglass befriended "the little white boys I met in the street. As many of these as I could, I converted into teachers." But to break Douglass of his thirst for knowledge (and independence), Douglass's master leased him out to a poor farmer for the express purpose of having Douglass "broken." The farmer whipped Douglass for the slightest infraction, "My natural elasticity was crushed, my intellect languished, the disposition to read departed and the dark night of slavery closed in upon me and behold a man transformed into a brute!" Three years later, still only 20, Douglass made his escape to the North. And what made his escape possible were the writing skills he so diligently acquired. He was able to disguise himself as a free seaman and used forged papers to prove he was not a slave. Few whites would think to question these papers, assuming a slave would not be able to write or create such a document. As a free man, Frederick Douglass would become one of America's foremost abolitionists and a lifelong crusader for African American rights.
