Overview

Newport Gardner's Anthem explores the remarkable life of Occramer Marycoo, an enslaved African who went on to become one of early America's most important Black leaders. In the mid-eighteenth century, Marycoo was taken from West Africa to Newport, Rhode Island, where he was forced into racial bondage and given a name that symbolized the power that his new city and new enslaver held over him: Newport Gardner. In this powerful book, Edward E. Andrews pieces together newspaper articles, church records, letters, and Gardner's own writings to tell the story of his life. After acquiring his freedom via a winning lottery ticket in 1791, Gardner became a kind of Founding Father for Newport's free Black community. He became a popular educator to young Black Newporters, and emerged as a key religious figure, serving as a long-standing pillar of Newport's First Congregational Church and later founding an independent Black church in the 1820s. His final act was leading a group of about three dozen Black New Englanders to Liberia, in hopes that a new start in Africa would be better than the discrimination they faced in America. A richly textured account, Newport Gardner's Anthem tells the story of a forgotten Black leader while exploring the new, but tragically limited, opportunities for formerly enslaved people in the post-Revolutionary world.

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Edward E. Andrews is professor in the Department of History and Classics at Providence College. His research lies at the intersection of race, slavery, and religion in the early modern Atlantic World. From his home studio on the Jersey Shore, Brian P. Craig helps his clients make a lasting connection with their audiences. Brian has narrated more than thirty audiobooks, many of them for Recorded Books. He has also voiced a national radio ad campaign for Scotts Turf Builder, explainer videos for the Federal Emergency Management Administration, and the in-development character of J Jonah Jameson for Marvel's SNAP game. Brian was selected as a 2025 finalist in the Professional Audiobook Narrators Association's Narrators of Distinction Program.

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