AUP. Ep. 42: The Depths of History
AUP EP#42 TRANSCRIPT
Transcribed: Cameron Blackwell
Completed: 3/1/22
Cortney Wills: [00:00:03] Hello and welcome to Acting Up the podcast that dives deep into the world of TV and film that highlights our people, our culture, and our stories. I’m your host, Cortney Wills, Entertainment Director at theGrio. And this week we’re going into the depths. So last week I talked about Descendant, which was a documentary that I saw at the Sundance Film Festival directed by Margaret Brown, who was a guest on Acting Up, as well as Kernen Jackson, who was a historical consultant on that project, all about Africa Town and the Clotilda, which is the last known slave ship to arrive here from Africa in 1860. And as I told you, that was just the beginning of the stories that we’re going to start seeing about this epic discovery and the ongoing quest to uncover the truth about our history. Over on Disney+, you can check out National Geographic’s latest project Clotilda, Last American Slave Ship, which offers a lot more insight into what’s going on with the mission to bring up the ship that has been miraculously preserved in mud more intact than any other slave ship wreckage that we know of and has a ton of implications for the future. Aside from that unmissable documentary, National Geographic has also launched a podcast called Into the Depths, featuring Tara Roberts, a National Geographic explorer, and storyteller who follows a team of Black divers on a quest to document and identify sunken slave shipwrecks. The poignant six-part audio series begins as Robert sets off on a journey of a lifetime with divers and marine archeologists, descendants of shipwrecks, and historians investigating the lost stories of the slave trade, both to expand the historical record and to honor the estimated 1.8 million unsung souls who perished during the Middle Passage. Tara is my guest today on Acting Up, and I could not be more excited to share her incredible story with all of you, as well as figuring out what’s really going on under the water. Considering the fact that I’ve been completely mesmerized by the story of the Clotilda and by all of the things that we still have to discover on Acting Up. Hi, Tara. I want to know all of the things about this incredible work that you do and what it kind of stands to tell us. Your new series with Nat Geo really kind of invites listeners into, I think, your journey and your work. And I think a lot of people, I think it never really occurred to them that this was a thing. How did you get into this? Like, what’s the trajectory for someone who ends up specializing in this? [00:02:48][164.9]
Tara Roberts: [00:02:48] It was all accidental. And it started with a picture, a photograph in the National Museum of African-American History and Culture. I saw this picture of a group of Black women on a boat in wetsuits, and that stopped me in my tracks. I was like, “Wait, what?” And then when I looked to discover more about who they were, I discovered that they were part of this group called Diving with a Purpose, and that part of their mission was to search for and help document slave shipwrecks. And like you, I never thought about slave ships. Never thought about slave ship wrecks. Like, I never thought of that. So to discover these people who look like me doing this work, it just blew my mind. One. There’s the the adventure of it like that you can go underwater and you can swim and you can dive deep and then you can witness around this history. It just it like it blew my mind. And then as I started to discover more about what exactly they were finding and what this history was and how much of it is not in the history books, it’s it just I was like, “I want to help tell this story and get it out there in a bigger way because this is history that we should know. This is important for us.” All right. So I see the picture and I think I stand at that exhibit for at least a half an hour, if not more, I was just like what? and then they have a little interactive element where you can actually pretend like you are helping to find a wreck. And I was just I was loving it. And at the time, I had been working for a nonprofit that supported changemakers or people that had big ideas to change the world. And so my initial entree into this work was thinking, Oh, maybe I can help them get a grant. Like, maybe I can help them do the work, even though it touched my heart and my soul and I could see myself doing it. I didn’t give myself permission to say I could actually do that too, but I was like, I want to help. And so I reached out to Ken Stewart, who’s the co-founder of Diving with a Purpose. And he– the picture was primarily Black women, and some of them were hugging this older Black gentleman, and that was Ken. So when I called up, I talked to him, everything that he said I was like, “This is incredible. Oh my God. Like, he needs support for this work.” So I nominated him for a fellowship with my organization. And unfortunately, that didn’t work out. But it meant that Ken and I had like like four or five long conversations and he got to know me a little bit. He figured out that I was a Black woman and he was like, “Why don’t you come dove with us?” So I think I needed someone to extend an invitation to me to feel like I could take him up. And so I did. He got me into the scuba diving class. At the time, I was not thinking about this as a storyteller. I was just like, I can be a part of this work, and this is the first step in doing it. So I’ve got to get scuba trained. So it was a three-month-long course. It was taught by divers from this club called the Underwater Adventure Seekers, and it’s the oldest Black diving club in the country. In 2019, they celebrated their 60th year anniversary, so they have been around since 1959. (Wow.) Exactly. I was like, “What? I didn’t know about that. Oh, goodness.” So as I got my certification, I think the class started in February. I got certified by June. We did our check-out dive and then in October, I went on my first ocean dive. So it was really like that whole year of 2017. Me learning how to scuba dive. Me getting more familiar with these divers and the divers for the underwater adventure seekers, many of them were also instructors for Diving with a Purpose. So I also got to know more about Diving with a Purpose and more about these divers. And I just thought that they were incredible human beings. And so around that time I was like, Somebody should tell their stories. And I was like, “Maybe that should be me because I’m a journalist, so I think I want to do that.” [00:07:35][286.4]
Cortney Wills: [00:07:36] The other wild thing about this like, you’re a journalist like me, like it like this is actually a real thing that can happen, like, what can I do? And tell a story about? But I never would have even tried like this just opens an entire can of worms. I mean, you were a journalist, journalist, you were worked at Essence, and like so many places, and I think you’re right, like when you– when you have that particular skill telling a story, it could, you know, if you’re not, I guess, attuned like it can seem limiting. I’m always like, I have like one skill, you know? But the reality is, like so many things that do matter and could matter to any one of us like that particular skill. People need their stories told. And I think that in that vein, being a storyteller is limitless. Whether you’re talking about on screen or a podcast or in a book or on a TV show, that is what is so incredible about this and so inspiring to me. [00:08:33][58.0]
Tara Roberts: [00:08:34] And here’s the thing for me, I had taken a bit of a detour from journalism. I had gone into the nonprofit world. So back in 2008, I’ve been working at Cosmo Girl magazine, and Cosmo Girl was one of the first victims of the economic downturn. And so it died. And when it died, I decided to like chuck everything I. I was like, I don’t want to go back into another job. I felt like I was. I was not in my purpose. And so I wanted to tell a story then that meant something to me. So when I came across this story, I was like, “No, no, no, this is a story that I want to tell. This is what you need to step into ful-time. Me, as journalist.” Like it can be easy to get comfortable. Yeah, it can be really easy to get comfortable, especially like if you’re nicely paid, you have a nice title. But I also think that the universe speaks to you, and when it speaks, you’ve got to listen and everything about this story, just it felt like there’s nobody else writing about this. Nobody else is talking– like, this is incredible. These people are amazing. Somebody should help tell their story, and it felt like the universe was speaking to you. The ancestors were asking you to help do this work. [00:10:00][85.7]
Cortney Wills: [00:10:00] I am so moved by that. And just so like, yes, I mean, I wish I would have bumped into you in 2008. I– my first job was that team people like straight out of college, right? And so we were like the biggest team, whatever that kind of started that trend that led to Cosmo girls and Teen Vouge. And all these things, and we also succumbed early to that like dot.com shift, and I was there when they transitioned to a website at first. But yeah, it was rattling to the point that like I packed up, moved home and went to law school. I was like, Oh God, this journalism s*** is volatile. Like, that’s not real, you know what I mean? Like, this isn’t a real thing anymore. They’re done. And so I too detoured. But I also- you know, I’m in entertainment. So I always, especially at that time and that brand kind of felt like, I don’t think this is like why I went to Northwestern. Like, I don’t think this is why I really learned to write like to tell you about Britney Spears is lipstick or like bikini. You know, like, I feel like I’m wasting my talent or my passion. And of course, now I think the work that I do is absolutely so fulfilling. But you do always wonder, like, what if I didn’t have it here? What if I had turned left? I would have loved to go with you, girl. I would have been diving and, you know, helping people and helping women. But I just I think that that really is so cool. And I wonder just at that time, right? Like when you make this big U-turn or detour in your life, especially after you’ve had some success and are good at something and established there. What were the people in your life? What were the people around you at the time? How are they like reacting and what were they saying to these? I would think kind of surprising plans that you’re laying out. [00:11:41][100.7]
Tara Roberts: [00:11:42] I think for the most part, people were actually supportive because I’ve had a few of these U-turns in the past and they’ve kind of worked out. So now people are like, OK, all right, we’re going to trust that you’ll be OK. The first time I did one of those U-turns, people were worried about me. They thought I was flaky. I needed to get a job. I need to get a steady job. I should have a 401k. Like, really, people did not believe in the vision. It felt right to me. And so I didn’t care as much, even though I was scared sometimes. But it felt right. And I named my Instagram handle @curvypathTara, because I think that a lot of us are on the curvy path like my cousin has wanted to be a veterinarian since she was like five. And today she’s a veterinarian and she has her own practice and it’s amazing and beautiful. And it was a very clear trajectory. She went to vet school, you know, she interned, she worked. She has her own clinic. I am on the curvy path, and I think that there are a lot of us on the curvy path, and that’s a path that is often not treated with some love and some respect. You’re made to feel like it should be something other than what it is, but sometimes you can’t see what’s around the bend. But it is all connected. And so now, after I’ve made those U-turns a few times, people are starting to see the curvy path and they’re like, OK, maybe she’s got something else going on there. [00:13:17][95.5]
Cortney Wills: [00:13:18] Respect a storyteller’s hustle. That’s what I will say. Always respect it. So now, I mean, here you are. You have jumped in. You have immersed yourself. You have been properly trained and you are out on the ocean. Where do you all even like start? I mean, like, is there a big map of the ocean with like X’s? And, you know, people have swam by and seen slave ships like, how do you even start to know that these things are here and where to find them? [00:13:45][26.2]
Tara Roberts: [00:13:45] That’s a great question because it does feel like a big mystery. There is one ship that has been found intact and that is the Clotilda. And the only reason that was found intact is because when the captain tried to hide the evidence and he burned the ship, he burned it in the Mobile River and it sank in mud and the mud preserved the ship. But the rest of the ships that are found in the ocean are not preserved. And because most of these ships were built in the 1600s and the 1700s, they were built out of wood. And so they are splintered on the ocean floor like they’re in pieces. There’s no way that anybody just sort of casually diving would be able to see a wreck. So the process starts in the archives and it starts with historians who do the research. And this is one thing surprising for me, might be surprising for you. But there are all kinds of records about these ships because most of the ships were insured. So these captains, these financial backers. So when the ships would wreck, the insurance companies would investigate. And so there are all these records about like the ship’s logs, captain logs, cruise logs, also cargo logs and then the wrecking event itself. They would document what happened during the wreck and events. [00:15:13][88.4]
Cortney Wills: [00:15:15] Like a car accident, like a police report after a car accident. [00:15:17][2.1]
Tara Roberts: [00:15:17] Exactly, exactly. And some of these would turn into court cases. And so there would be testimony from– so all of those records exist. So historians– you never going to find that right? [00:15:30][13.3]
Cortney Wills: [00:15:31] OK, here’s another maybe stupid question, but for me, Bear with me wouldn’t ever like in the 16 or 17 or 1800s if there was a shipwreck, wouldn’t everybody be dead? Like, like, you know what I mean? Who was giving testimony? I mean, where did– they swam somewhere? They had lifeboats? Like, what was the reality of that? [00:15:47][16.4]
Tara Roberts: [00:15:49] All right. So the São Jose De Africa, that’s the ship that was found off the coast of Cape Town. South Africa. It was identified in 2015. So they had over 500 Africans on board that were captive and 212 died. The rest made it to shore and then were sold into slavery. There’s the Federic’s Quartus and the Christianus Quintus in Costa Rica, on that one the ship’s crew mutinied because the ship got lost like three times and ended up in Costa Rica when they were headed to St. Thomas. And so the crew, they ran out of food. The crew mutinied they set the 650 Africans in the hold free on the shores and then they burned the ship. So you’ve got like different stories. There are some instances where people die. There’s another one a horrible story with The Wanderer, or is it the Lewiston? Sorry, it’s one of those. Don’t quote me as I’m not sure which one. But in that one, the ship, it’s a horrible story. The ship hit a rock. It was off the coast. I think it was headed to Cuba. Don’t quote me. I’d have to get my details right. But it hit a rock and the ship started to take water, and the captain couldn’t figure out a way to get it out. So what he did was he set the crew, got into rowboats and they rowed to safety. And then he locked the hold of the cargo hold, which had like over 600 Africans in and they drowned in the wreck. It took days for the wreck to fully sink, so they were locked in that hold. And I’m sure that that captain filed an insurance claim to get his money for that. So you’ve got all kinds of different stories like that happened. [00:17:45][116.1]
Cortney Wills: [00:17:47] That is so devastating. But also, again, like so eye-opening to what this work can actually tell us about what happened to us. (Yes.) What happened before we were taken or when we were taken? (Yes.) And on the journey and when our ancestors got here. And you never really get like the (the details,) the play-by-play details of that. You get like little snapshots. You know, it’s like two pages in the chapter of what happened. And it’s also I think I mean, gosh, I literally still remember. I think it was like third grade was the first time at school that it was like a family tree, family heritage, you know, cultural stuff, you know, and you’re supposed to like, find out what you know, what your roots are and like, you’re like Mexican and you were like a mariachi outfit, I guess, you know, the 80s is very racist. You bring enchiladas and like, that’s what I did because my mom is Mexican, and my dad was like, Oh yeah, no, we don’t know Black people don’t know that we’re slaves. And that was it. And like, it was actually first grade when I learned that. And I remember thinking, like, forever that’s just it until I went to college. And then there’s, you know, African-American history. But even there, you hit a point where it’s a bunch of question marks and kind of I think we collectively resolved to like, we’ll never know that. We’ll never know that. And the fact like that, these discoveries, that’s what hit me so hard with the story of the Clotilda is that it’s like all of a sudden there. Like, Oh my God, this thing I thought we could never have never have access to, never reach, didn’t exist was lost forever isn’t. And like, what could that mean? (Yes,) It’s really breathtaking. It’s really, really breathtaking. And there’s a lot of drama in there, like my TV and film mind. Like what you just said about that one terrible thing that happened. Like, there’s a movie, the Clotilda like getting burnt down and like, then it’s stuck in the mud, in the mud, preserves it, and then this family that’s still in that city running shit that, like, actually ordered that ship. You know, now they’re like, “Hey, y’all, where’s our money, now we have DNA. We’ve been telling you that that was our grandpa. Now you can see it. Give us the money.” Like, talk about a mini-series that could have like twenty-five seasons, you know, like how many Underground Railroad projects have you seen? This is like times a million. That was one thing. This was the transatlantic slave trade for hundreds of years when you talk about content. But when you also talk about experience and history that we thought was lost and now we found that does not happen every day. And it sounds like the developments being made right now really stand to change a lot of what we know, what we thought we knew and what we stand to know, right? [00:20:32][165.5]
Tara Roberts: [00:20:33] Very true. Much of that history is completely unexamined. You know, it’s a footnote. But it can’t be a footnote. I always say this, but I have to say that I didn’t think about it until I started this work, and I started to really look at the Middle Passage with bigger eyes wanting to examine it. But the global slave trade just again, we know this. But then do we really notice it involved four continents to its Europe, Africa, South America, North America? It went on for four hundred years to transport twelve point five million Africans across the waterways means that coastlines changed, landscapes changed. Wealth got built like it’s it changed. The course of history it is a monumental event in history that we don’t treat like that. [00:21:25][52.0]
Cortney Wills: [00:21:26] Yeah, it’s actually longer than any span of time like that we know of since then. Like, we don’t have 400 years of Black people here like that. It hasn’t been that long, been that long yet. [00:21:37][11.4]
Tara Roberts: [00:21:38] The world looked completely different before the slave trade, and it looks different after the slave trade, and that’s what we have today, [00:21:45][7.0]
Cortney Wills: [00:21:46] It’s like dinosaurs. Dinosaurs, slave trade, those are the two stamps on the timeline of existence. Pretty much. [00:21:51][5.0]
Tara Roberts: [00:21:52] I love that! Yes. And then when you think that the only stories that we have about the Middle Passage and the global slave trade, for the most part, I mean, there are some slave narratives. There are some smaller stories, but it’s primarily from ships, captains. It’s from white historians. Looking back, and I’m not saying that that’s not valid because there is information that they’re seeing that we should look at and examine. Well, I mean, I think so. But it’s one perspective like there’s there are, as I have learned, and this is the number that completely boggles my mind. It’s 1.8 million Africans died in the Middle Passage. 1.8 million Africans– who is representing for them? Where are their stories? Then, of course, we will never know all of their stories. But like, that’s a lot. It’s a completely different lens than we often look at it and what might we uncover. So that is part of this work with slave ships is beginning to uncover these stories. I have to tell you this one story that really illustrates this point. I think really well, it’s the story of the São Jose De Africa. So that ship that was found in 2015, they discovered came from Mozambique, and I did not know this personally. This is just one little fact, but Mozambique, somewhere between like 500 thousand to a million Africans were trafficked from Mozambique. So our history is not just West Africa, it’s East Africa. But, who teaches us that? So when we’re looking for connections and lineage, it could be Tanzania, it could be Mozambique, it could be that side of the world anyway. So the team discovers that this ship is from Mozambique and they discover what happened from it exactly like they know. Two hundred and twelve people died. They know what ethnic group was primarily in the cargo hold. And so the team decides to go back to Mozambique and to share news of what happened to those ancestors, to the descendants in Mozambique. And when they go back like they are met with celebration because it’s the Makua ethnic group. So the Makua people are happy to know what happened to their ancestors. And so this moment is a moment of celebration and there’s dance and their songs and their speeches. And then at the end of it, the Makua chief hands the dive team or the team working on the wreck, this sacred vessel that’s made out of cowry shells. And he puts soil from Mozambique into the vessel. And then he charges the team with going back to South Africa and distributing that soil on the wreck site so that his ancestors can touch home for the first time in over 200 years. And so they go and do that! And the African-American, they choose an African-American, a South African, and a Mozambican to do that ritual. And they do. And what happens is a level of healing of closure, like something else gets transferred when that happens. So this work of slave ship wrecks, of recovering memories and not just staying inside of the pain and the trauma, but moving to the healing it allows something to transform inside of us. And that’s what makes, I think, this work so powerful. It connects the past to the present, which then allows us to build a different kind of future. [00:25:30][218.4]
Cortney Wills: [00:25:31] Everything you just said, yes, like I got goosebumps. That is exactly what gripped me when I kind of stumbled into this subject matter. And I can’t. It’s like, I’ll never be the same now. Actually, it’s like now that I know this or and am like, once we know this, it’s not going to change everything. But that’s different than saying, like, I’ll never be the same. I’ll never look at it quite the same way. And maybe, you know, our future generations won’t have to. And that is just really, really exciting to me. I could talk to you. I really could. I want your cell number, I want to talk to you just for fun. But I know that I don’t have you forever. But one thing I do want to know is like, OK, so what are just maybe some examples of the things that you find down there? You know, again, in my unknowledgeable brain, I think something sinks into the ocean and, you know, it’s halfway burned and it’s in pieces and the ocean moves and like, aren’t there waves and tides? Like, how spread out is all of this s***? And like, OK, what you get like a splinter of wood and you’re like, Yeah, this is from the bathroom on the ship, like, what are you looking for? What is down there? [00:26:38][67.2]
Tara Roberts: [00:26:39] Well, some of the telltale artifacts from a slave ship. Our shackles, like that’s a big one, and they do find those you can find the name of a ship like, sometimes you’ll find something a piece of wood with the name on it or the bell of a ship, but other sort of slave ship artifacts are– and this might be surprising. But if there is a site that has a big pile of bricks or of ballast stones, they’re like they’re just big stones. It could be indicative of a slave ship because they would often try to balance out the weight of the ship with all the humans in the cargo hold. There would be a lot of bricks and things like that to balance the weight, so that’s often indicative. You might find things like elephant tusks because they were trading like they were trading for human beings, they were trading guns, they were trading, you know, beads for human beings, so sometimes you find those artifacts of trade. So like beads, tusks, sometimes it’s pottery. I knew in Costa Rica they found a bottle cap that was a Danish bottle cap and that began to fit the story of the Danish ships that had wrecked there. So you find those kinds of things, and wood is important, too. That’s how they were able to identify that the São Jose came from Mozambique is because of the wood of the ship. Turns out, when they tested the wood and they did get like a hunk of wood. They tested it and it turned out to be wood that comes from the Mozambican hinterland. So that was also a clue. So it’s like those kinds of things. [00:28:19][99.7]
Cortney Wills: [00:28:19] How could there be DNA on stuff that’s been underwater for hundreds of years? [00:28:24][4.7]
Tara Roberts: [00:28:25] So it probably can’t get in the ocean, but that’s what makes the Clotilda so unique, because the mud preserved everything, so they’re able to go down and to scrape off some stuff and make the tests. Yeah, it’s a really unique case the Clotilda, it’s full of information, yes. [00:28:45][20.0]
Cortney Wills: [00:28:47] This might be the actual craziest s*** I’ve ever heard. Like, that’s real that I didn’t even know a little bit. You know what I mean? Like, it might be the biggest actual surprise that I’ve had in a long, long time. Has there been one thing that you actually like, saw, like, have you found a shackle? Have you like seen something pulled out of the water that was instantly identifiable or recognizable or impactful to you? [00:29:10][23.6]
Tara Roberts: [00:29:12] I saw an anchor that was a part of a ship. I have seen pottery. I have not seen anything as dramatic as a shackle. Like that, I don’t even know how I would, how I would deal with that. But I’ve seen these other parts, and I would say that when you know the stories behind them, there’s definitely like a feeling of, oh, you know, like there’s some sadness, depending on what the story was. But there’s also, I think, a feeling of empowerment and an agency where it’s like, Yes, I am seeing something that can help add to the story, which we are bringing back into collective memory. And that feels amazing and important. You know? [00:29:58][46.2]
Cortney Wills: [00:29:58] It is so important Tara. It is so, so, so important. I’m so grateful to you for sharing just some pieces of this work that you’re doing with us. I am totally mesmerized and like, captivated. I can’t wait to get all the way through your podcast and hear more about it. And like I also something you said a minute ago hit me and it was. It was. It was like this. I’ve seen simulations and, you know, images of the slave trade and of ships, you know, in college and things like that. You see more real stuff about that when you’re studying it. But of course, I’m a long way out of college. And so it had been a long time when I had watched descendants. You know that I saw like Black bodies naked piled on top of each other at the bottom of a ship. And it was instantly it was a recreation after they found the Clotilda. But it was. It was jarring to me when I saw it. But what was also so remarkable was how it was us watching the actual descendants of those actual people seeing that image for the first time. And then it’s not abstract. It’s literally like that one of those spines belongs to my actual great grandpa kind of thing. Yeah, it does something. [00:31:17][78.8]
Tara Roberts: [00:31:18] It changes it. [00:31:18][0.6]
Cortney Wills: [00:31:19] It changed. It changes it. [00:31:20][1.5]
Tara Roberts: [00:31:21] There’s such a way that we look at the past and those who were enslaved, they blur together. They are quote unquote slaves. They are faceless statistics. They are this horror, this pain that you don’t really want to touch. But the truth is that they were human beings who lived, loved, laughed. How do we bring the humanity of their stories to the fore? And that’s what begins to have us wrap our brains and our arms around this history. You know, like if it is some abstract thing that you can’t touch and it feels so horrible to touch, who wants to do that? But if you know Cujo Lewis and you, you’ve read Zora Neale Hurston, Barry Coon and you’ve heard him laugh. And you know, some of the stories that he tells and he becomes a human being. That’s how you move through this past and this history. And that’s the opportunity for us right now. As African-Americans, we are finally able to uplift our stories in such a way that we can. We can see them. We can honor the past. I was just talking to somebody the other not too long ago, and I was like, I don’t think that we can heal this space without honoring the ancestors without honoring. And for so long, they have been unacknowledged and not honored. [00:32:50][89.8]
Cortney Wills: [00:32:51] They’ve been archetypes like figures in my mind, not real, real, you know, people and even something so small that I actually I don’t know when or why it occurred to me, but I’m sure I read it somewhere. But like just a small shift of like, I really try not to say slaves or like refer to people as slaves, rather like enslaved people, people who were enslaved. And that’s, you know, OK. But like, no, really. If you don’t do that, you actually reduce an entire people, an actual human down to the crime that was inflicted on that person. It’s like calling, you know, someone a rape victim like, you know you, you wouldn’t stop saying their name or stop calling them women who, you know what I mean? Like, that’s just it’s actually kind of brutal. It’s actually kind of brutal that it that they have ever been kind of framed that way and relegated to that. And I think coming to just little realizations like that feels like a tiny step and taking, you know, some of the power back or like the story back the narrative back like, yo, let’s call it what it was. These people were stolen and they were enslaved, but that is not who they were. (Well said,) I encourage everyone listening to check it out. It is really, really something to see, you know, Black History Month and beyond. It is it is really, really cool to live in a time where this stuff is really being discovered. Thanks so much for joining me. [00:34:20][89.4]
Tara Roberts: [00:34:21] Thank you. It’s been a pleasure. [00:34:22][1.0]
Cortney Wills: [00:34:26] Thank you for listening to Acting Up. If you like what you heard, please give us a five star review and subscribe to the show wherever you listen to your podcast and share it with everyone you know. Please email all questions, comments and suggestions to podcasts@theGrio.com. Acting Up is brought to you by theGrio and Executive Produced by Cortney Wills and Produced by Cameron Blackwell. For more with me and Acting Up check us out on Instagram @ActingUp.Pod. [00:34:26][0.0]
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