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Letter from Frederick Douglass to Anne Tyson Kirk

Description

Handwritten letter from Frederick Douglass to Anne Tyson Kirk in which he inquires on the progress of a published biography on astronomer and fellow Maryland native Benjamin Banneker (1731-1806), based on the writings of Kirk's mother Martha Ellicott Tyson (1795-1873). He thinks that "every colored man who reads will want it, and those who cannot will want their children to read it." Douglass also remarks that "if I am right in this I will take fifty copies of the first Edition for gratuitous circulation."

Date

1882-04-11

Language(s)

Extent

2 pages

Resource ID

21679

Notes

The Benjamin Banneker biography discussed in this letter was eventually published in 1884 by the Friends' Book Association and is entitled "Banneker, the Afric-American Astronomer: From the posthumous papers of Martha E. Tyson and edited by her daughter, Anne T. Kirk." Martha Ellicott Tyson was the daughter of George Ellicott (1760-1832), who was a friend of Benjamin Banneker.

Digital Publisher

Digital resource provided by the Maryland Center for History and Culture

Rights

The Maryland Center for History and Culture believes this work to be in the Public Domain under the laws of the United States and it therefore may be used, reproduced and distributed without permission. As MCHC is responsible for the digitized version of this work, MCHC requests attribution for material obtained from this website, citing our name and the resource ID.

Rights URI: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-US/1.0/