Harriet Tubman was nearly ghosted from her own story. The National Park Service is walking back quiet changes to its Underground Railroad webpage that dramatically downplayed Tubman’s presence. Gone was a large photo of her. Gone was a powerful quote. And the word “slavery” appeared nowhere until paragraph three.
Instead, the revised page focused on American ideals of liberty — as if Tubman hadn’t risked her life fighting a country that denied liberty to Black people. Let’s be clear, Tubman wasn’t a footnote in this history, she was the movement.
Following a Sunday report by the Washington Post and backlash from historians and educators, the page has been restored. But the move raises serious concerns, especially in a political climate where anti-DEI agendas are scrubbing Black history out of federal spaces. If there’s one thing Tubman taught us, it’s never to stop moving forward.
