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Inheriting the Trade
- A Northern Family Confronts Its Legacy as the Largest Slave-Trading Dynasty in U.S. History
- Narrated by: Thomas Norman DeWolf
- Length: 8 hrs and 35 mins
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Publisher's summary
Inheriting the Trade is Tom DeWolf's powerful and disarmingly honest memoir of the journey in which 10 family members retraced the steps of their ancestors and uncovered the hidden history of New England and the other northern states.
Their journey through the notorious Triangle Trade - from New England to West Africa to Cuba - proved life-altering, forcing DeWolf to face the horrors of slavery directly for the first time. It also inspired him to contend with the complicated legacy that continues to affect black and white Americans, Africans, and Cubans today.
Inheriting the Trade reveals that the North's involvement in slavery was as common as the South's. Not only were black people enslaved in the North for over 200 years, but the vast majority of all slave trading in America was done by Northerners.
With searing candor, DeWolf tackles both the internal and external challenges of his journey, writing frankly about feelings of shame, white-male privilege, the complicity of churches, America's historic amnesia regarding slavery - and our nation's desperate need for healing.
An urgent call for meaningful and honest dialogue, Inheriting the Trade illuminates a path toward a more hopeful future and provides a persuasive argument that the legacy of slavery isn't merely a Southern issue but an enduring American one.
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"Inheriting the Trade is like a slow-motion mash-up, a first-person view from within one of the country's founding families as it splinters, then puts itself back together again." (Edward Ball, author of Slaves in the Family)
"The author's descriptions of the places and history he discovered along the journey are powerful, and the topic is both compelling and important." (AudioFile)
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How the Word Is Passed
- A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America
- By: Clint Smith
- Narrated by: Clint Smith
- Length: 10 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Beginning in his hometown of New Orleans, Clint Smith leads the listener on an unforgettable tour of monuments and landmarks—those that are honest about the past and those that are not—that offer an intergenerational story of how slavery has been central in shaping our nation's collective history, and ourselves.
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Sincerely grateful read
- By Kelvin Dixon on 06-08-21
By: Clint Smith
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White like Her
- By: Gail Lukasik PhD, Kenyatta D. Berry - foreword
- Narrated by: Bernadette Dunne
- Length: 9 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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In the historical context of the Jim Crow South, Gail explores her mother's decision to pass, how she hid her secret even from her own husband, and the price she paid for choosing whiteness. Haunted by her mother's fear and shame, Gail embarks on a quest to uncover her mother's racial lineage, tracing her family back to 18th-century colonial Louisiana. In coming to terms with her decision to publicly out her mother, Gail changed how she looks at race and heritage.
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Disappointed
- By Yoli on 06-06-18
By: Gail Lukasik PhD, and others
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Because Our Fathers Lied
- A Memoir of Truth and Family, from Vietnam to Today
- By: Craig McNamara
- Narrated by: Keith Sellon-Wright, Craig McNamara
- Length: 7 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Craig McNamara came of age in the political tumult and upheaval of the late '60s. While Craig McNamara would grow up to take part in anti-war demonstrations, his father, Robert McNamara, served as John F. Kennedy’s Secretary of Defense and the architect of the Vietnam War. This searching and revealing memoir offers an intimate picture of one father and son at pivotal periods in American history. Because Our Fathers Lied is more than a family story—it is a story about America.
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Title Does Not Reflect Scope of the Book
- By Amazon Customer on 07-15-22
By: Craig McNamara
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The Blue Sweater
- Bridging the Gap between Rich and Poor in an Interconnected World
- By: Jacqueline Novogratz
- Narrated by: Jacqueline Novogratz
- Length: 10 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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The Blue Sweater is the inspiring story of a woman who left a career in international banking to spend her life on a quest to understand global poverty. It all started back home in Virginia, with the blue sweater, a gift that quickly became her prized possession - until the day she outgrew it and gave it away to Goodwill. Eleven years later in Africa, she spotted a young boy wearing that very sweater, with her name still on the tag inside.
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A Heartfelt Testament
- By Gallantly Rabbit! on 01-23-11
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Dreams in a Time of War
- A Childhood Memoir
- By: Ngugi wa'Thiong'o
- Narrated by: Hakeem Kae-Kazim
- Length: 7 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Of Kenya's largest ethnic group, the Kikuyu, Ngugi wa Thiongo was born in 1938 in the backlands of his country (Kiambu district) to a father whose four wives bore him two dozen or so children. Ngugi was the fifth child of the third wife. His father was a peasant farmer forced to become a squatter after the British Imperial Act of 1915. Before going off to school, he had what was then considered a bizarre and inexplicable thirst for learning....
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An escape through education
- By Tango on 06-17-12
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Life Beyond Measure
- Letters to My Great-Granddaughter
- By: Sidney Poitier
- Narrated by: Sidney Poitier
- Length: 10 hrs and 2 mins
- Abridged
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Sidney Poitier is one of the most revered actors in the history of Hollywood. He has overcome enormous obstacles in extraordinary times and is a role model for many Americans because of his convictions, bravery, and grace. Poitier reflects on his amazing life in Life Beyond Measure, offering inspirational advice and personal stories in the form of extended letters to his great-granddaughter.
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Mix of family history and life advice.
- By Adam Shields on 10-31-19
By: Sidney Poitier
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Street of Eternal Happiness
- Big City Dreams Along a Shanghai Road
- By: Rob Schmitz
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 12 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Modern Shanghai: a global city in the midst of a renaissance, where dreamers arrive each day to partake in a mad torrent of capital, ideas, and opportunity. Marketplace's Rob Schmitz is one of them. He immerses himself in his neighborhood, forging deep relationships with ordinary people who see in the city's sleek skyline a brighter future, and a chance to rewrite their destinies.
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Deserving of better audio
- By Rachael on 02-19-18
By: Rob Schmitz
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The Not-Quite States of America
- Dispatches from the Territories and Other Far-Flung Outposts of the USA
- By: Doug Mack
- Narrated by: Jonathan Yen
- Length: 10 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Everyone knows that the United States of America is made up of 50 states and, uh...some other stuff. The territories of American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the Northern Mariana Islands, and the US Virgin Islands are often neglected, but they are filled with American flags and national parks and US post offices and some four million people, many of whom are as proudly red-white-and-blue as any Daughter of the American Revolution.
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Worthwhile Learning
- By Bessie Mae on 05-02-23
By: Doug Mack
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The Pendulum
- A Granddaughter's Search for Her Family's Forbidden Nazi Past
- By: Julie Lindahl
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 9 hrs
- Unabridged
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This powerful memoir traces Brazilian-born American Julie Lindahl's journey to uncover her grandparents' role in the Third Reich, as she is driven to understand how and why they became members of Hitler's elite, the SS. Out of the unbearable heart of the story - the unclaimed guilt that devours a family through the generations - emerges an unflinching will to learn the truth.
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Exceptional
- By Jean on 01-14-19
By: Julie Lindahl
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While the World Watched
- A Birmingham Bombing Survivor Comes of Age During the Civil Rights Movement
- By: Carolyn Maull McKinstry
- Narrated by: Felicia Bullock
- Length: 7 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Fifteen-year-old Carolyn Maull McKinstry was just a few feet away when the Klan - planted bomb that killed four of her friends exploded in the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. It was one of the seminal moments in the Civil Rights movement, a sad day in American history…and the turning point in a young girl's life.
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Look Back and Live With Greater Understanding
- By jerrie Will on 05-07-21
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In an Antique Land
- History in the Guise of a Traveler's Tale
- By: Amitav Ghosh
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 9 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Once upon a time an Indian writer name Amitav Ghosh set out to find an Indian slave, name unknown, who some 700 years before had traveled to the Middle East. The journey took him to a small village in Egypt, where medieval customs coexist with 20th-century desires and discontents. But even as Ghosh sought to re-create the life of his Indian predecessor, he found himself immersed in those of his modern Egyptian neighbors.
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Mixed Worlds
- By Roger on 10-26-10
By: Amitav Ghosh
What listeners say about Inheriting the Trade
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- PeacefulSeeker
- 03-04-13
Confessional
Thomas DeWolf's personal reading lends to credibility. I've read a considerable amount of American history including black history--what makes this work stand out is the personal investment in uncovering uncomfortable realities.
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- Rachel
- 09-29-15
A VERY important book!
This book taught me a lot more about this country's legacy....one I'm bitterly ashamed of. But it also showed me that it doesn't have to end in shame; Americans have a responsibility to KNOW what happened & take their part in repairing the damage that their forefathers' evil practices caused & are still causing. Thank you for this book, Tom!
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1 person found this helpful