Title-Family, Freedom, and Flowers: Former Slave Samuel Green’s Six Decades at the Foot of the College Hill
For generations after the Civil War, everybody that climbed the steps to Canton’s fine old college walked past 908 Lewis Street- a place former slave and Civil War veteran Samuel Green called home from 1876-1942. This presentation explores Sam’s incredible journey from Tennessee slavery to service as a cook in the 21st Missouri Infantry, to his 66 year tenure below the college as the town’s premier master gardener and much respected citizen. Samuel and his family, with help from three important local institutions-The Christian Church, Christian University, and the Masonic Lodge, cultivated a long legacy of freedom and blooming beauty at the foot of the Hill despite the failure of Reconstruction and the advent of the era of Jim Crow in Missouri.