On Feb. 3, Eugene Robinson, Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist and author, discussed his new book, “Freedom Lost, Freedom Won: A Personal History of America” (2026, Simon & Schuster), in a hybrid conversation at the Brooklyn Public Library’s Center for Brooklyn History (BPL-CBH).

The conversation was moderated by Darren Walker, who is the current president of the National Gallery of Art (NGA). Discussing what led him to write this book, Robinson shared a bit of the story of his great-great-grandfather.

“This boy called Harry,  in 1829, in Charleston, South Carolina, was sold by a woman named Isabella Perman, to a Charleston area plantation owner named Richard Fordham. He was sold along with a woman named Jenny and her children, I think, Hagar and Margaret. And for the lot Richard Fordham paid, I think it was $1,300. He was put to work at a blacksmith’s forge, and he became a very skilled blacksmith,” Robinson explained. It happened again in 1848, when he was sold to a Charleston businessman named Otis Mills for $2,000, which he said was a lot of money at that time.

He added that his great-great-grandfather, whose formal name was Henry Fordham, became a free man ten years before the Civil War, and his life changed. It wasn’t an easy time in history due to slavery, but according to papers owned by Robinson’s great-grandfather, he was still able to pursue getting a college education and becoming successful in buying and selling land at the time, as Robinson mentioned.

Robinson also explained how he paid homage to the women in his family through the book, and stated, “Major Fordham had three sons and three daughters, and one of the daughters was my grandmother, who was a piano teacher. You know, she was a teacher, which for Black people and Black women was the highest occupation in our community.”

In addition, he shared that his great-aunt was a nurse, specifically the first accredited nurse, Black or white, in her hometown of Orangeburg, South Carolina.

Remembering his great aunt’s impact on the community as a nurse, Robinson said, “She had gone to Claflin University, and then she wanted to go to nursing school. There wasn’t really any place nearby she could go to nursing school. So, she went off to Hampton Institute in Virginia and became a nurse. I remember her when I was a little kid. She was essentially the chief medical officer for South Carolina State University, another HBCU in Orangeburg, for 30 years or something.”

Discussing the purpose of writing, Robinson said, “This was about the ancestors.”  “Every story is distinctive, but my story has a lot in common with that of many African-Americans. I wanted to show that we were there in all these great historical events from the beginning, from before the Mayflower, and there were some events and some periods that we perhaps saw from a different vantage point.”

Those interested can purchase “Freedom Lost, Freedom Won” here: https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Freedom-Lost-Freedom-Won/Eugene-Robinson/9781982176716.

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