Sojourner Truth - rainbow, detail

Telling Herstory: Sojourner Truth -During the Women’s Right Convention in Akron, Ohio, May of 1851, Sojourner Truth, an emancipated slave, spontaneously went to the platform and electrified the crowd with her "Ain't I a Woman?" speech. Calling the speech one of the most unique and Interesting speeches of the Convention, the newspapers of the time do not record the speaking style used by Frances Gauge thirty years later when she recalled the speech for publication. They gave an account highlighting what they heard but acknowledging, “It is impossible to transfer it to paper, or convey any adequate idea of the effect it produced upon the audience. Those only can appreciate it who saw her powerful form, her whole-souled, earnest gestures, and listened to her strong and truthful tones.”