What Price Freedom?

The Underground Railroad Experience is available by reservation only, and for groups only.

“The Underground Railroad was neither hewn of lumber nor wrought of steel; people made up the ties and rails of liberty … people who risked their lives, property, and freedom to defeat the inhuman institution of slavery.”

The Underground Railroad Experience located at the Plain & Fancy Farm Theater with excursion into the heart of Lancaster County, PA, tells the story of slavery from its beginning in Colonial America, with a focus on the flights to freedom via the Underground Railroad and the heroes who surfaced, most little known. Our “Free Man” encounter is purposefully not with a “slave,” but with a free African American, thus presenting a different view of the Black community of the time, revealing how Blacks and Whites worked together in this struggle.

We also relate these stories to our neighbors, the Amish, and to contemporary freedom fighters like Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. We hope for students to discover that these are not just stories of Black history or overcoming religious persecution hundreds of years ago in Europe, but part of the story of our Nation, of us all, who we are today and will become tomorrow.
Read more about the “stops” as you plan to bring your students along for the journey…

Learning Outside the Classroom … Never More Memorable

The truth is that our schools have traditionally devoted relatively little time and attention to slavery in America and certainly to the subject of the Underground Railroad that transported 1000s of those enslaved northward to freedom.

Thus, perhaps the lack of knowledge or this cursory look at this part of our history has made our youth, albeit unknowingly, question its importance and relevance for today.

Our mission here was not to shrink from the horrors of slavery, but rather to expose its inhumanity and degradation of the human spirit at the same time inspiring young people to recognize injustices, empowering them to challenge, change and improve conditions they come across in their own lives.

As educators, we know the power of changing the narrative of African enslavement from one of shame into one of resistance and innovation under extreme circumstances, to instruct us to look to our past so that we can understand our present and prepare for our future.
–Brian Favors, M.Ed., and Lurie Daniel Favors, Esq., adapted from THE BIRTH OF A NATION, companion book to the 2016 film about Nat Turner.