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The idea of courage has been on my mind a lot this week. The new book I've started reading is called The Original Black Elite: Daniel Murray and the Story of a Forgotten Era by Elizabeth Dowling Taylor. One of the scenes is straight out of a movie.

They were called The Rescuers - a group of proud black abolitionist men, who acted in opposition to the evil Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. The town was Oberlin, Ohio, an extremely progressive little town for the time period. While it wasn't Utopia, within its city limits black and white people lived in relative peace. The town was known to be adamantly anti-slavery. 

Well, word got out that a fugitive slave by the name of John Price had been kidnapped from Oberlin and was being smuggled back to the south to be reintroduced to slavery. The town of Oberlin wasn't having it!

Scores of Oberlinians tracked down the kidnappers, confronted them en masse, and managed to steal John Price back and smuggle him off to Canada to enjoy his humanity.

Many of The Rescuers were arrested and thrown in jail. Their story started gathering attention. They played this to their advantage and presented themselves as political prisoners (always use press to your advantage when you can!). Even the sheriff and jail keeper in charge of them felt bad and allowed them a lot of freedom.

Long story short, they got out after a few months. A couple of them went on to join John Brown in the massively courageous raid on the southern slave ship, where they paid the ultimate price. However, they live on in the Collective Consciousness as heroes and catalysts for the Civil War - which decided the issue once and for all.

It was so exciting reading about this. There's something about heroes - people who act bravely, according to their conscience, that is inspiring and motivating.

In a much smaller way, artists are heroes. Just being an artist is an act of courage. It isn't always easy to put your creations out there for the world to judge. It's not on the same level and freeing slaves, but freeing the soul from mediocrity and conformity is its own lofty battle.

There are lots of other types of courage as well. The courage to forgive. The courage to love. The courage to try again after failure.

How have you been courageous this week? What courageous act would you love to do in the near future?

Till next time,

Raven