Blog

Having just seen a play about Baltimore, the students were shown two videos offering further perspective on the city—the opening scenes of “Hairspray” and “The Wire.” They were then tasked to share their own views.

JUDAH…takes us back to the city’s founding in 1729 and the realities of slavery.

 POV Baltimore in 1729

It was just an ordinary Monday. Everyone was in World History class. I don’t really remember, but I was pretty sure Mr. Meade was talking about slavery when everything went wrong. Normally, Jason would’ve been the only person to fall asleep, but this time me, Danny, Riley, Mohamed, Ethan, Jordan, Kennedy, Madisyn, and Khori all fell asleep at the same exact time. 

When I woke up, the sun was beaming in my eyes, and when I looked around, I finally realized, I was no longer inside the classroom; I was on a cotton plantation!

Massa: “N*gger why is you standing there actin’ like you just woke up from a dream? Pick the f*ckin’ cotton n*gger.”

Mohamed: “Oh I’m so sorry Massa. You have to excuse my friend over here, he just got off the boat.” 

Massa: “Well keep him in check, wouldn’t want you boys to have any problems, now would you?”

Mohamed then turned to me and said with a confused look on his face:

Mohamed: “What’s up with you? Is you trying to get us whipped?”

Me: “What are you talking about, bro? Where are we, and why is that dude dressed as a slave master and why does he remind me of Ruth so much?

Mohamed: “I don’t know who this Ruth is, but I do know that if you keep actin’ like this, you finna blow up are cover.”

Me: “What are you talking about?”

Mohamed: “Don’t you know? We finna escape with Harriet Tubman tonight”.

Then Massa yelled out that we have to go inside, and everyone headed toward the slave shack. Inside the shack were Danny and Ethan. They were sitting at a table and seemed to be planning something. 

Danny: “Harriet Tubman is supposed to arrive at 9:00 tonight. If Kennedy is able to distract Massa, since she’s a house slave, then we can abandon her and escape by 10:00 all in one night. Ethan, do you have anything else you want to say?” 

Ethan: “I like fried chicken.” 

Danny: “Yes we all know you like your fried chicken, Ethan, but we need to be serious right now if we want to escape tonight”.  

Then, the clock finally hit 9:00 and we heard a yelling sound and Harriet Tubman rushed into the shack, but it wasn’t Harriet Tubman, it was actually Khori.

Khori: “Ya’ll ready to escape this hell hole?”.

And with that, everyone in the slave shack jumped out and started running toward the North Star. While we were running, I looked back and saw Kennedy far behind us trying to outrun Massa.

Kennedy: “Guys wait for me”.

Danny: “Forget her. We have to keep running”. 

Eventually, we made it to Canada and we never saw Kennedy ever again. Oh, and also, we never saw Ethan again since he saw a rock that he thought was fried chicken and broke his mouth and fell off a cliff. The End.

 Judah E. Patterson

March 3, 2026