IN DETROIT YOU LOOK SOUTH TO SEE NORTH IS FREEDOM
Windsor will be in AWE of photo show of descendants of the Underground Railroad
by Stephen Weir
Black Heritage Society’s Dorothy Abbott and famed photographer Yuri Dojc look out the windows of the Art Windsor-Essex public art gallery (AWE) at the city of Detroit. For the next seven months, their new photographic exhibition of descendants of the Underground Railroad celebrates the direction of freedom—South. (The gallery sits on the edge of the Detroit River in downtown Windsor, south of Detroit).
On Thursday night, Abbott and Dojc will open their well-traveled photographic exhibition celebrating the descendants of freedom-seekers who escaped slavery in the United States before the American Civil War. Some made the journey entirely alone; others found their way to Canada with the help of a clandestine network of "conductors" and "stations" called the "Underground Railroad." Many passed through Detroit and into Windsor. Due to a quirk in the border line between the U.S. and Canada, Windsor is actually south of Detroit—hence the suggestion to temporarily rename the "North to Freedom" exhibition!
This evocative photographic essay highlights the descendants of those freedom-seekers. Approximately 30,000 men, women, and children fled north to freedom, settling from the Maritimes to as far west as the Manitoba border. Most came to what is now Ontario, to places like Windsor, Chatham, Buxton, the Niagara Peninsula, Owen Sound, and larger cities such as Hamilton and Toronto.
Some 150 years later, beginning in 2016, Canadian photographer Yuri Dojc began exploring the northern end of the Underground Railroad, presenting 30 images of descendants. Black and white, young and old, these are the grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and great-great-grandchildren of once-enslaved African Americans who have contributed significantly to Canada.
The exhibition of Dojc’s work has been curated by Dorothy Abbott, who has served as a volunteer director for three Ontario non-profit organizations: the Ontario Black History Society, the Grey County Black Heritage Society, and the Owen Sound Emancipation Festival. Although family ties have kept her rooted in the Grey County community, Abbott remains committed to supporting the study of the area’s rich Black history despite the distance between Owen Sound and her home in Toronto.
After a decades-long career in the financial sector, Abbott took on the role in 2018 as producer of North is Freedom, Dojc’s exhibit documenting the stories of descendants of formerly enslaved families who settled in Ontario and the east coast. She is a mother and grandmother who regularly shares Black History Month presentations at her grandson’s schools to educate young children about Canadian history.
What began as a hobby, an interest in genealogy and her family origins, has become a passion for promoting Black Canadian history and its links to African roots and the impact of the transatlantic slave trade on the U.S., Caribbean, and Central and South America. Abbott’s passion has led her on numerous trips to the southern U.S. and Caribbean islands like St. Vincent, St. Lucia, and Grenada to trace her family tree.
One of Dojc’s evocative images captures an older woman with short white hair seated beside a quilt, wearing a blue dress. Yuri Dojc is a renowned Toronto photographer and artist, known for his dedication to historical narratives. His journey began in commercial photography, which eventually grew into a lifelong commitment to documenting history. Displaced in 1968 by the invasion of Czechoslovakia, Dojc sought refuge in Canada.
His series North is Freedom: The Legacy of the Underground Railroad is a testament to his ability to convey powerful stories through art. Dojc has also documented the last living Holocaust survivors in Slovakia in his internationally exhibited series Last Folio and, in his most recent project Last Salute, he honors World War II veterans from the "Greatest
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