This is a story based on a true person with some changes

Name:  Henry Toll                                                                        March 2017

Humanities                                                Africans in NY: Creative Narrative Assignment

 

                                You Are Never Free

 

I was never given a chance. My name is Solomon Peters and I was part of the first slave generation born in New Amsterdam. I worked all day at a plantation, learning how unfair life is. I had no name when I was born, but my master decided to reward me. So he gave me a name. I think he just wanted to make his life easier by making it easier to remember me.

My only family was my dad, but he was mentally broken by his sorrows. My father was called Berewa, until they took his name away. He was the leader of our tribe back in Africa. He was the first person in our tribe to become enslaved. He was defending our village from the white man. They had guns. He had only a stick he found on the ground. He fought with everything he had. He told me about how the men beat him to the ground. He said how everything went black shortly after he fell. He had woken up in chains and a gag was in his mouth. He told me about the travel from Africa to America. He told me that to survive the Middle Passage and the walk to the coast you had to have no emotion. The white men would call them property and not human. He had become not human when he saw a man fall and die on their way to the coast. He could not even stop moving for the man that died. The man’s wife went for him, and the white men beat her to the ground and chained her even further. He told me about the shrieks of pain that came from all around him on the slave ship.

He explained how lucky I was to be born here. He was not the same when he left that ship — he was obedient and not sane. He had been broken on that ship, and had been made new into a tool. My father died of serious back pain from his hard work on our plantation. He had taught me to be a fighter for my freedom.

I worked hard for many years, but I was fed up. I found a way to escape without running away. A year after my father died, I sued the Dutch West India company for my freedom. I was 19. He inspired me to fight and become free, not to break like him. I won and was given $2. Then I worked at a black farm for 10 years.

My old master was very angry at me leaving and tried illegally to get me back. I ran from the farm with my money to the Blacklands outside New York. I met Maria that year in the Blacklands. She had also been a slave, but had run away and became free. She became free because some nice black man had bought her then set her free. I married her and we had a family. I was living the good life for many years. I had a nice family and a big farm. I was happy.

But currently, I am starting to wonder if I am safe. I have noticed white men looking at me in the town center. I am scared they are going to take me and even worse my family back to the plantation where I grew up. A plan started to form in my head to lead the slave hunters away. Even though I was young, I wrote my will to protect my family, so if I died they would get everything. I first gave everything to my wife. When she passed, my oldest son would get 4 pounds, I gave the rest of my kids 18 shillings.

I left that night pretending to be sneaky. I did this to make the slave hunters follow me. On my way out, I grabbed some gunpowder. I ran to the forest, where I would execute my plan. I was going to scare the men, by using their religion against them. I set up a fire in a very dense dark area of the forest. Then I put some sticks in weird angles around the fire to make them look like some ancient language. I set up 4 piles of gunpowder around the fire, with little trails to me were I could light them. I finally started the fire. It was massive, at least 8 feet tall. I made deep footprints in the soil towards the fire. Then I walked over the sticks into a bush near by. Then I waited. I knew the men would follow me.

It was nightfall when they arrived. I could see they were scared by their faces. There were 3 of them. They all had swords except one. One of them had a gun, another was wearing a fancy hat, and the final was a servant.

The servant said “This looks like demon magic, the devil be here.”

“There be no devil here, now keep your mouth quiet,” the man with the fancy hat said.

Then, I said in my best demonic voice “Ha ha ha, you foolish humans are my people now.”

The man with the gun came closer to the fire. I could see him more clearly. He was wearing a redcoat uniform.

They were Brits or loyalist, I don’t know but they were the enemy. They were trying to make life harder for us free blacks. Many thought they were going to pass some serious bills.

The redcoat with the gun said “We are good christian men and you can not control us.”

I said in return in that demon voice “You have entered my area and are now my subjects.”

The servant started to run away from this fire.

The man with the fancy hat said “Get back here you coward, or I will put a reward for your death.”

The servant turned around and came back. The man with the gun, now looking down at the ground closely, said “ What happened to the runaway slave? His footprints walk into the fire.”

I said in the demonic tone “This is a portal to hell, the greatest prison for my people.” I continued in that voice to say “That slave is now part of my people and he wants revenge.”

The man with the hat stepped back, and I could see his face. He was my old master.

He said “I do not fear you Satan, the power of God propels me.”

“God does not have power in the new world, now fear me,” I said in that tone.

At that moment, I lit the fuse to the gunpowder and hit the tree next to me in the same rhythm as my father’s old drum song. The gunpowder exploded and all the men jumped back.

I could tell they were scared. Good, very good.

My old master said in a shaky voice “That song is from that old slave born in Africa.”

I said in the demonic tone “Yes, it is the calling of Satan. I will haunt you!” The servant ran away again, but this time the rest followed.

My old master said “I will have none of this, I am going back to England where their are no God-hating patriots or slave ghosts.”

I never saw those men again, but I knew I could not go back to my family. If I did, my master would know that I was not dead and would enslave us all. I moved to a new house in a village 3 miles north. Every year I would check on my family. I lived a peaceful life for the rest of my days. The last I heard of my family they had to give up their property, because of some laws passed by the British.

Name: Henry Toll                                             Humanities

7th Grade                                                                         Comparative Essay

                                    Fear is the Worst Emotion

Imagine you had everything you ever wanted. Imagine that you had an amazing house and everyone respected you. You didn’t have to do anything and had many people helping you. Then imagine that your wonderful life would disappear in an instant and you would be thrown in jail or have all your belongings taken away from you. You would be blacklisted and your reputation would be forever damaged. You might even be betrayed by your family. The only way you could stop this is by keeping other people in jail or having them hanged. What would you do? Throughout American history there has been a lot of fear of change, which doesn’t help our society because change is how we make progress. People misuse their power and use hysteria to pause change. Specific periods of time that demonstrated misuse of power were, the Salem witch trials, the McCarthy era, and current day. Self cautious groups of people who feared minorities witch hunted those less fortunate groups of people to secure their powerful roles in society, .For example, in the current era our newly elected U.S. President, Donald J. Trump is misusing his power by lying about the truth and using fear to convince people to support him. Fear tactics are used throughout history to spread hysteria. Hysteria is such a high level of irrational fear that it gets people to do crazy things and many people believe the hysteria. Power hungry figures, misuse their power to stay in control and by doing so they feed the hysteria.                      

In The Crucible, a character named Danforth uses hysteria and fear of witches to keep himself in power. He accuses hundreds of people without evidence to fuel the hysteria and convince the masses of people to believed in the afflicted girls. There was so much hysteria around fear of  witches, that people could not see through the lies of the girls. This shows how easy it is for a group of people to lose their minds in the face of danger. Another example of Danforth’s thirst for power “And do you know that near to four hundred are in the jails from Marblehead to Lynn, and upon my signature? And seventy-two condemned to hang?” (Arthur Miller, The Crucible, page 92, act 3, Danforth stated). This shows that Danforth is misusing his power of being a judge. Danforth is willing to put innocent people in jail in order to stay in power. Even when he is shown proof of innocence, Danforth denies it or tries to find a way out of it. This man should be more open minded especially because he represents the people. A way Danforth could do this is if he looked through the lies. But because of Danforth’s religion and because he wants the faith of the people in his society, he doesn’t think the girls are pretending. When Danforth feeds the hysteria using his power then he gets even more power. It is a never ending loop of chaos. Danforth gains control from having hysteria around, because their religion says he has power to see through witchcraft. So when Danforth encourages it, the Providence people think that God approves of it and that it is holy and good. When Abigail accused the people that were proving Danforth wrong, he immediately threw them in jail. When people start not to believe in the witches, Danforth tries to bargain with people with their lives if they confess that they were witches or wizards. He is always trying to make himself look good and to make everyone else look bad. Danforth’s style of getting power from hysteria and fear is shown again in American history through Senator Joseph McCarthy.

In the 1950’s Senator Joseph McCarthy used the hysteria from the threat of communism to make false accusations and blacklist innocent people. After World War II, in America there was a Red Scare which means fear of communism. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, or The USSR had nuclear weapons with warheads which could be launched across the world and blow up the world. The intense fear of the nuclear threat and communism taking over the world was fuelled by McCarthy. He used fear to make a hysteria to empower himself. He used tactics that are immoral and malicious, an example of this is, “ I have here in my hand a list of 205 [Men} that were known to the secretary of state as being members of the Communist Party,” (Fitzgerald, McCarthyism, on page 1), but all of the accusations were false. He used the list of names as an example many times and made hysteria from it. He even used the names to blacklist innocent people which ruined reputations and in doing so he ruined many people’s lives. This shows how McCarthy misused his power as a Senator. To keep himself in authority, McCarthy kept the lies going and kept scapegoating more and more people. This is a fear tactic that has been often used throughout history by many power hungry people in order to stay in power. This tactic is again being used today by our current president, Donald. J. Trump.

Currently Donald. J. Trump is using the tactics of hysteria and fear to single out whole races and saying bad things about them. He has used his power and influence to make a hysteria of Immigrants to gain power. He says many things he will do, and to keep himself in power he does almost all of them. He does not care for America, but what he can get out of being President. An example of his ruthless tactics is, “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. … They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists,” (In june 2015, Donald Trump). This shows how Trump is making people hysterical about migrants to make people vote for him. He is using these claim to persuade ignorant people to support him. Trump gained power by this because people fear the things. Trump makes it sound like immigrants are the source of these bad things like drugs and crime. People are persuaded because he is a famous, rich, successful person in the business world. He has used this influence to create fear and hysteria of everything he does not like. In conclusion, Donald J. Trump may be the worst out of all of those power hungry leaders in America’s history.

Fear is one of human beings’ worst emotions because it causes people to become caught up in hysteria. Empowered people can become corrupted because they may find a way to bend this fear in their favor. They do not care who they hurt, but what they get out of it. This has happened many times throughout history, even now with our enlightened society. An good example of this is, “power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely,” (John Dalberg-Acton). This is very true in American history. One  example of this is in the Salem Witch Trials because Judge Danforth and Abigail found a way to control people by using their fear of witches against them. Danforth used his power to punish people who went against him. Another example is the Second Red Scare because Senator McCarthy used the American people’s fear of the USSR and Communism to make himself very powerful. Sadly, this is still happening today. President Trump has used the fear of immigrants to make false accusations and seize power. In conclusion, humans need to adapt more when they are faced with change because adapting is how we survive. Humans need to be more open minded and make up our own minds with real facts, rather than just by following someone else’s opinion. These leaders take over by saying crazy lies, and people buy into the lies and don’t check if their words are true. Would you have voted for Donald J. Trump if you did not know anything but his opinion? Or, would you have thought to yourself, “That doesn’t sound real?” Be honest.

 

Name:       Henry Toll                                       Humanities

7th Grade                                                                         Comparative Essay

Outline for Crucible/McCarthy Comparative Essay

 

Theme: Hysteria and misuse of power

 

Paragraph #1: Introductory Paragraph (GIT)

 

Grabber Statement (G):

Imagine you had everything you ever wanted. Imagine that you had an amazing house and everyone respected you. You did not have to do anything and had many people helping you. Then imagine that all of this would disappear in an instant and you would be jailed or have almost nothing. You would be shamed and a person that was almost abandoned by your family. The only way you could stop this is by keeping people in jail or hanging them. What would you do?

 

Introduction of Theme (I):

Throughout American history there has been much fear of change, but change is how as a human race we move forward. Some of the main moments this happened in American history were the Salem witch trials, the McCarthy era, and current day. An easy way to make the majority feel safe is by doing witch hunts or singling out a whole minority as bad to make those minorities feel unsafe.

 

Thesis Statement (T):

  

When hysteria is happening, a power hungry leader misuses her or his power to stay in control and by doing so, feeds the hysteria.                                                                                                                                                                   

                           

 

_________________________________________________________________________

 

Paragraph #2: Crucible Thematic Connection

 

Topic Sentence (T): In The Crucible Danforth uses hysteria and people’s fear of witches to keep himself in power.

 

Explanatory Sentence (E): There’s so much hysteria about witches that people can not see through the lies of the girls. This shows how easy it is for a group of people to lose their minds in the face of danger. This hysteria becomes truly crazy when Danforth starts accusing hundreds of people of witchcraft.

 

Evidence (E): Another example of Danforth misusing his power is on page 92 “And do you know that near to four hundred are in the jails from Marblehead to Lynn, and upon my signature? And seventy-two condemned to hang?”

 

Analysis (A): This shows that Danforth is misusing his power. He is willing to put innocent people in jail in order to stay in power. Even when he is shown proof he denies it or tries to find a way out of it. This man should be more open minded and should look through the lies. But because of his religion and wanting the faith of the people he doesn’t even think the girls are pretending. If he feeds their hysteria with his power then he gets more power, it is a never stopping loop of chaos. He gains control from hysteria, because their religion says he has power to see through witchcraft . So when he encourages this, they think that God approves of it and that it is holy and good. Then when Abigail accused the people that were proving Danforth wrong, he immediately threw them in jail. When people start not to believe in the witches, he tries to bargain with people for life if they confess that they were witches or wizards. He is always trying to make himself look good and everyone else bad.

 

Concluding/ Transition (C):  Danforth’s style of getting power from hysteria and fear is shown again with McCarthy.

 

__________________________________________________________________________

 

Paragraph #3: McCarthy/Red Scare Thematic Connection

 

Topic Sentence (T):

In the 1950’s Joseph McCarthy used the hysteria of the threat of communism to make false accusations and blacklist innocent people.

 

Explanatory Sentence (E):

After World War 2, in America there was a Red Scare which means fear of communism. The USSR had nuclear weapons with warheads which could be launched across the world. The intense fear of communism was fuelled by McCarthy. He used fear to make a hysteria to empower himself.

 

Evidence (E):

He used tactics that are immoral and malicious, an example of one is on page 1, “ I have here in my hand a list of 205 [Men} that were known to the secretary of state as being members of the Communist Party,” but all of the accusations were false.  

 

Analysis (A):

He used the list of names as an example many times and made hysteria from it. This shows how he misused his power as a senator. To keep himself in authority, he kept going with the lies and scapegoating more and more people. This is a tactic that has often been used throughout history by many power hungry people in order to stay in power.

 

Concluding/ Transition (C):

 

I think this is a tactic that is being used today by our current president, Donald. J. Trump.

__________________________________________________________________________

 

Paragraph #4: Modern Day Witch Hunt Thematic Connection

 

Topic Sentence (T):

Currently Donald. J. Trump is using the tactics of hysteria and fear to single out whole races and calling them bad things.

 

Explanatory Sentence (E):

He has used his power and influence to make fear of terrorism to gain power. He says many things he will do, and to keep himself in power he does almost all of them. He does not care for America, but what he can get out of being president.

 

Evidence (E): An example is on the article on npr in the politics section tilted Countries Listed On Trump’s Refugee Ban Don’t Include Those He Has Business With it says “President Donald Trump’s refugee ban in the Middle East could be one of the first conflicts of interest for the president, as his bans avoided nations that he has business ties in.”

 

Analysis (A): This also shows his misuse of power because you are not allowed to have business ties while in office. He has many ties with companies and has acted on them, which is so illegal. People believe a lot of what he says because he is a famous, rich, successful person in the business world. He has used this influence to create fear and hysteria of everything he does not like.

 

Concluding/ Transition (C): In conclusion, Donald Trump may be the worst out of all of them.__________________________________________________________________________

Paragraph #5:  Paragraph (ROC)

 

Reflection on Thesis (R):

Fear is one of human beings’ worst emotions because it causes people to become caught up in hysteria. Empowered people can become corrupted because they may find a way to bend this fear into their favor. They do not care who they hurt, but what they get out of it. This has happened many times throughout history, even now with our enlightened society.The quote “power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely,”  by John Dalberg-Acton is very true in American history.

 

Overview of Main Points (O):

An example of this is the Salem Witch Trials because Danforth and Abigail found a way to control people by using their fear of witches against them. Danforth used his power to throw anyone who opposed him in jail. Another example is the second red scare because McCarthy used the American people’s fear of the USSR and communism to make himself very powerful. Sadly, this is still happening today. Trump has used the fear of terrorism to make false accusations and seize power.

 

Concluding Idea (C):

In conclusion, humans need to adapt more when they are faced with change because adapting is how we survive. We need to be more open minded and make up our own minds with true stories, rather than just buy someone else’s opinion. That is how these leader take over. They have crazy lies, but people buy them and don’t check if it is true. Would you have voted for Donald Trump if you did not know anything but his opinion? Or would you have thought to yourself that doesn’t sound real? Even if there were people dying because of something? Be honest.

Reflection of Outline Essay

In  my opinion, my essay is well formatted and dives deeply into thoughtfulness. It is not well said or edited yet, but it has good content. The outline helps me stupendously because it helped me know in which order to write things and how my teacher wanted the essay formatted. When I say the outline helps me know in which order to write, I mean that it shows me where to put sentences and how to put them in the best order. For example, my past essay on The Giver was good before editing. But, since I didn’t have this outline, I had to go back and rearrange my words and paragraphs into the proper order before finishing it. I think that this outline is a very good format tool for an essay, because it is simple at first, but then pushes your thoughts to go deeper. I think this is good because at first you just have to start writing and get your ideas out, but then later you need to improve your writing and thoughts. In conclusion, I am satisfied with my outline for this essay and am happy to move on to the fun stuff, editing.