Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Scott Shane joins Midday.  He retired from the New York Times in 2019, and dove into a very different kind of project: a book that tells the story of the extraordinary Thomas Smallwood. Born into slavery, Smallwood purchased his freedom and helped hundreds of other enslaved people escape their bondage in the Baltimore-Washington area. Along the way, Smallwood coined the term “underground railroad.”

Shane details the life of Smallwood in his book, Flee North: A Forgotten Hero and the Fight for Freedom in Slavery’s Borderland.