North Words: Black Pioneers in the Adirondacks

What is it that makes the North Country so special? From North Creek to South Colton, from Old Forge to New Bremen, host Mitch Teich brings you interviews, on-site recordings, and special features that remind us what makes the region a special. WCNY Community FM is pleased to present North Words, from our colleagues at North Country Public Radio. In this episode: A conversation with Amy Godine. The Saratoga Springs-based writer has been studying issues of race and history in the North Country for years, and her new book is called The Black Woods: Pursuing Racial Justice on the Adirondack Frontier. Godine shares the story of Gerrit Smith, a 19th Century Upstate abolitionist and land heir who devised a plan to help free Blacks obtain suffrage by providing them with land to settle and farm in the Adirondacks. Then, in a radical shifting of gears, we meet Ryan Vickers, a North Country native who has appeared on around a dozen game shows in four countries (and in two languages), and collects experiences the way some of us collected baseball cards.