This is Amy Wagenaar from the Historical Society of Michigan with a Michigan history moment. Her name was Isabella, and during the 19th century, she became a leader of the abolitionist movement. An African American woman who never learned to read or write, she became a living legend. She settled in Battle Creek, Michigan, and from there witnessed the emancipation of the enslaved people for whom she had labored so hard. Isabella was born about 1797 in Ulster county, New York. Enslaved from birth, Isabella married an enslaved man, Thomas, in about 1815. They had five children. But during the next 11 years, Isabella was sold several times. She finally rebelled in 1826, taking her infant daughter Sophia and walking to freedom. Having essentially stolen herself, Isabella settled in New York City. She emerged on the national stage in 1843 when she announced that she would travel the north as an itinerant preacher and speak out against slavery. The abolitionist movement was still in its infancy, but Isabella journeyed through the east and Midwest, preaching against slavery and promoting human rights. Although illiterate, she was a dynamic force in the abolitionist movement. Her list of friends was a who's who of the nation's leading abolitionists, Wendell Phillips, William Lloyd Garrison, Laura Haviland, Lucretia Mott, Susan B. Anthony, and Harriet Beecher Stowe. In addition to speaking out against slavery, Isabella promoted women's rights and suffrage, temperance and prison reform. She earned a living by selling photographs of herself that were captioned I Sell the shadow to support the substance and from royalties from her biography published in 1850. She moved to Michigan in 1857, settling first in the Quaker village of Harmonia and then nearby Battle Creek. In Michigan, Isabella continued her fight for human rights. During and after the Civil War, she worked with the Freedmen's Bureau to help newly emancipated slaves. You might think that you've never heard of Isabella, but you have. You see, in 1843, the enslaved woman who stole herself changed her name as an itinerant preacher. Isabella had become, in essence, a sojourner for truth. And that is why we know her today as Sojourner Truth. Passing away in 1883, Sojourner Truth is interred in Battle Creek's Oak hill Cemetery. In 1999, a 12 foot tall bronze statue of this remarkable woman was established in the city's Monument Park. This Michigan history moment was brought to you by michiganhistorymagazine.org.