In 1847 St. Louis, Missouri, when a new law against educating African Americans forces Reverend John to close his school, he finds an ingenious solution to the new state law by moving his school to a steamboat in the Mississippi River. Includes author's note on Reverend John Berry Meachum, a minister, entrepreneur, and educator who fought tirelessly for the rights of African Americans.

"Carter G. Woodson was born ten years after the end of the Civil War, to parents who had both been enslaved. Their stories were not the ones written about in history books, but Carter learned them and kept them in his heart. Carter's father could not read or write, but he believed in being an informed citizen. So Carter read the newspaper to him every day, and from this practice, he learned about the world and how to find out what he didn't know....

A young girl flees from the farm where she has been worked as a slave and uses the Underground Railroad to escape to freedom in the north.