Finding Your Roots

(gentle piano music) -

Henry

We could not be certain that the anonymous hash marks on this schedule represent Roy's ancestors. But we soon uncovered a document that erased all doubt. In 1857, Cary Wood, the slave owner, passed away. And his estate records contain a list of familiar names, showing that generations of Roy's family were owned by this one man. -

Roy

Jefferson, Melissa, William, George and Sam. What do you think it must have been like to raise children in slavery? You know, remember when I asked you what you wanted to grow up to be? What do you tell your child that they're gonna grow up to be? They're going to grow up to be a slave, unless there's a civil war, which nobody could imagine in 1850. No, the liberation of our people was not inevitable, believe me. 750,000 people died to end slavery in the United States. The biggest advantage that I have in raising in my son that my ancestors didn't have in raising their children is that I can give my son hope. Absolutely. There was no hope back then. No hope, but they made hope out of no hope. Somehow they made, as black people say, "a way out of nowhere". They had children, multiple generations of children, and they bided their time so that you and I and people like us would one day be free, and free to fly in terms of our ambition. And they bided their time and knew one day it will come. Yeah. (gentle music)