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Summary
Summary
Relates the adventures of York, a slave and body servant to William Clark, who journeyed west with the Lewis and Clark Expedition of 1804-1806.
Author Notes
Rhoda Blumberg was born in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, New York on December 14, 1917. She received a B.A. degree from Adelphi University in New York. After graduation, she worked as a freelance writer, researcher, and producer for both CBS Radio and NBC Radio, a talent scout for Simon and Schuster, and wrote features for several national publications. She got married in 1945 and spent more than 20 years raising their four children.
In 1973, she worked as executive editor of Simon and Schuster's travel guides. She soon decided to try writing children's nonfiction. Her first book, Firefighters, was published in 1975. She wrote more than 25 nonfiction books over the next 30 years. Her books included The Incredible Journey of Lewis and Clark, The Great American Gold Rush, The Remarkable Voyages of Captain Cook, Shipwrecked!: The True Adventures of a Japanese Boy, and York's Adventures with Lewis and Clark: An African-American's Part in the Great Expedition. Commodore Perry in the Land of the Shogun was awarded a 1986 Newbery Honor and won the Boston-Globe-Horn Book Award and the Golden Kite Award. She received the Washington Post/Children's Book Guild Award for her overall contribution to nonfiction. She also collaborated on several books with illustrator Murray Tinkelman including The Truth About Dragons and Backyard Bestiary. She died on June 6, 2016 at the age of 98.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (4)
Horn Book Review
(Intermediate, Middle School) All of the members of Lewis and Clark's Corps of Discovery were recruited, save one: York, William Clark's ""personal 'body servant'"" (i.e., slave). And even though the members of the expedition have been described as ""the writingest explorers of all time,"" York could not write, and therefore left no record of his experiences. So Blumberg charted a difficult task for herself when she chose to make York the focus of this account of Lewis and Clark's journey. Remarkably, she succeeds. Journals, liberally quoted and thoroughly documented, reveal that York was an accomplished hunter and successful trader. They contain references to the Indians' belief that the color of York's skin implied spiritual powers. Records also show that York, as a slave, was never paid for his contributions but that he did vote on where to spend the winter on the West Coast. These few facts cannot hold a book together, and Blumberg is left to speculate about York's actions, thoughts, and contributions. But she never fabricates. She consistently distinguishes between fact and opinion (""Because he could swim, York was probably of great value in the water shoving, guiding and freeing the boats"") and uses such suppositions to reveal something about the history of the times or the expedition as a whole. ""At the start many of the men undoubtedly wondered how York would fit in. In line with the prejudices of the time, they believed that black people were inferior human beings who had little feeling and low intelligence.... York was surely troubled, too. Because he was a slave, he must have feared he would be disdained and singled out to do demeaning, disagreeable tasks for everyone."" The clear chronological narrative encompasses biographical elements, historical events, and social customs. Explanatory endnotes, a bibliography, and an index (not seen) complete the book. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
Gr. 4-8. Blumberg, author of The Incredible Journey of Lewis and Clark (1987), now offers an account of the same journey featuring York, the only African American member of the Corps of Discovery. William Clark's playmate as a child and later his personal slave, York joined his master on the expedition, where his strength, skills, and courageous acts were recorded in the journals. His black skin and strong physique amazed and impressed many of the Native Americans, perhaps helping the corps gain acceptance. Blumberg notes that without York, the expedition might have failed. Reproductions of paintings, prints, photographs, documents, and artifacts illustrate this large-format book, which concludes with a bibliography, Internet sites, and several pages of endnotes, containing background information and citations for the many quotations from books, letters, and journals. Although much of York's life was unrecorded, this clearly presents what is known and acknowledges speculation where it occurs. Your shelves may be bulging with Lewis and Clark expedition books in this bicentennial year, but make room for this one. --Carolyn Phelan Copyright 2003 Booklist
School Library Journal Review
Gr 5-8-Renewed attention is being focused on the astonishing achievements of Lewis and Clark and their Corps of Discovery during this bicentennial of their expedition, but the focus of this book is rare. The participation of Clark's slave, York, is mentioned in most accounts of the expedition, but Blumberg centers on his contributions, which were significant. His strength and hunting abilities were invaluable. Readers are told repeatedly of the Native Americans' fascination with him, supposedly because they had never seen a black person before. York's agility in spite of his size also impressed the indigenous people the Corps met. The social history included in this account is also of interest. Although Lewis and Clark felt superior to the Native Americans, they managed to negotiate with them peacefully. The seeming respectful treatment of York during the expedition did not carry over after the return. Clark truly believed in slavery and in his right to dictate the man's life. York did not personally reap any benefit from the expedition and was not even officially listed as a member of the Corps. This well-researched selection helps to round out the study of an amazing event in our country's history and is a good companion to Blumberg's award-winning The Incredible Journey of Lewis & Clark (Morrow, 1995). Meticulously documented and illustrated with black-and-white photos and reproductions, this is a solid purchase for all collections.-Renee Steinberg, formerly at Fieldstone Middle School, Montvale, NJ (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
An account of York and the Lewis and Clark Expedition is two stories in one: the grandeur of the expedition and the cruelty of slavery. The story of Lewis and Clark is well known; York's story--an enslaved man on the journey with his master, William Clark--may be new to many readers. York returned from the heroic journey only "to realize, once again, that he was totally a slave, considered to be inferior to every white person." York did not receive the double pay and 320 acres of land each enlisted man received and was not even included in the official list of men who had gone on the expedition. Blumberg's fine writing, the attractive text full of maps, sketches, portraits, and other archival materials, and the dramatic cover with a detail from Ed Hamilton's sculpture memorializing York make this one of the best new works on the subject and a fine one-two punch with the author's The Incredible Journey of Lewis and Clark (1999). (introduction, endnotes, bibliography, index) (Nonfiction. 8-12) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Excerpts
Excerpts
York's Adventures with Lewis and Clark An African-American's Part in the Great Expedition Chapter One The Early Years Imagine a boy of twelve or thirteen being the slave of a fourteen-year-old master! That took place on a plantation in Caroline County, Virginia, in 1784, when an enslaved black boy was assigned to be Master William Clark's personal "body servant." Like many other slaves, this boy didn't have the legal right to a last name. Family names were for whites only. He was just York, called "that Negro York" or "that boy York." York and William had been playmates ever since they were old enough to walk. Growing up, they played together as equals, roamed in nearby woods, and taught themselves to swim in its streams and ponds. These carefree days were fated to end. As soon as York and William became adults -- both over the age of twelve -- they were bound together in a changed relationship. The contrast was as clear as white against black. William became the master whose commands had to be obeyed; York was his slave, his lackey, who had to heed all of William's wishes. One could say that York was lucky that John Clark, his owner, chose him to become body servant for William, the youngest of his six sons. It was, indeed, a privileged position. York had been singled out not only because he was William's companion, but also because he was strong enough to be a bodyguard, efficient enough to accompany an up-and-coming Virginia gentleman, and smart enough to use good judgment. All that is known about York's parents are their names, which were listed in John Clark's will, dated 1799. York's father was called Old York; his mother was named Rose. Old York may have been John Clark's personal servant, and Rose may have been a house servant. Black household servants, like York, were "upper-class slaves." As a personal body servant, York slept in the Clarks' home within earshot of William. He wore clothing that matched the style and quality of his master's (probably hand-me-downs from William and his older brothers). He ate fine foods from the Clark family kitchen, acquired polished manners, and had a way of speaking that sounded "white," with hardly a trace of a slave's speech patterns. He was much better off than Clark's field-workers. After turning twelve, these slaves were ordered to work from dawn to dark tending the plantation's tobacco crops and vegetable fields. They wore coarse shirts and trousers that were made by slave women. Their masters supplied shoes, to be used when the weather was raw or when the ground was rugged. Most of the time they went barefoot. Their diet featured corn, molasses, beans, and gristly scraps of pork. To sleep, they coiled themselves on top of straw-covered boards inside dingy huts where floors were dirt and tables and chairs were boxes. All slaves -- even household servants like York -- were forbidden to learn reading and writing. Books were deemed dangerous in the hands of slaves, because reading about freedom might incite them to revolt against their bondage. They might start a rebellion. They might run away. It was a crime to teach them to read, give them books, or show them how to write. Masters were constantly haunted by the threat of slave revolts. They were so alarmed that slaves who tried learning to read were whipped, branded, or had their ears cropped; sometimes they were put to death. Owners were so edgy that horns and drums were banned because slaves sounding them could signal the start of a rebellion. That had happened in 1739, when slaves near Charleston, South Carolina, used drums to send messages to one another, then rose up in pitched battle against their masters. Before this uprising was put down, thirty white men and forty-four black men had been killed. Stories about this revolt, called the Stono Uprising, were passed down by the enslaved and the planters for generations. Many southerners were also upset by the existence of free blacks. They feared that the very sight of them set a bad example for slaves, who might be prompted to seek their own liberty. Free blacks had to carry certificates of freedom in every southern state at all times, but even with these identification papers, they risked being seized and sold into slavery. In the South, special patrols were set up to cross-examine free blacks and arrest stray slaves. If York wished to wander outside of the plantation, he had to carry a handwritten pass from his owner, called a "remit," for his own protection. Any white person could stop him, and if he did not have this pass he could be whipped before being returned to his master. Fear of straying slaves was so strong that, according to codes in South Carolina and Georgia, it was legal to kill any slave who was found away from his or her plantation if he or she was unaccompanied by a white person. Runaway slaves posed a serious problem that worried owners. The problem became especially alarming during the Revolutionary War, when an estimated thirty thousand slaves ran away from Virginia and a total of one hundred thousand escaped from the South to find freedom for themselves. News about freed slaves and runaway slaves undoubtedly reached slave quarters, as did worrisome reports about William's five older brothers, who were fighting for American freedom. York was four or five, and William was only six years old, when they learned that William's brother John was imprisoned on a British ship. Everyone on the plantation was affected by the news. John came home after six years of prison, his health broken, and he died in 1783. Richard died during the war; his body was never found. Jonathan, Edmund, and George Rogers survived the war and returned as heroes. George Rogers Clark was famous. He had led astounding battles that defeated British forces in the Ohio Valley. York's Adventures with Lewis and Clark An African-American's Part in the Great Expedition . Copyright © by Rhoda Blumberg. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold. Excerpted from York's Adventures with Lewis and Clark: An African-American's Part in the Great Expedition by Rhoda Blumberg All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
