Click on the link above to download an advance copy of the booklet that will accompany the Modern-Day Slavery Museum when it hits the road this weekend. The booklet contains a rigorous, well-researched examination of the history and evolution of slavery in Florida’s fields that provides an excellent background to the materials on display in the museum.
Here’s an excerpt of what you’ll find there:
| “… Migrant Farm Labor and Debt Peonage
As the nineteenth century drew to a close, mid-Atlantic truck farmers began to sell greater quantities of fresh fruits and vegetables to urban markets. This model spread southward with the aid of rail lines and refrigeration technology, and in the 1920s, grower-shippers expanded citrus, sugarcane, and winter vegetable production in central and south Florida. These large-scale operations required a distinctly precarious workforce: one that would arrive just prior to the labor-intensive harvest and leave immediately upon its completion. Growers faced a |