**PLEASE NOTE THIS IS A VIRTUAL PROGRAM THAT WILL TAKE PLACE VIA ZOOM. Registrants will receive an email with Zoom meeting information the week of the event.**

Talk followed by Q&A discussion, featuring UMass Lowell's Distinguished University Professor of History, Robert Forrant, PhD. 

The purchase of tons of baled cotton made up 80% of the capital outlay of Lowell factories. Cotton made Lowell's world go round. There is no question but that the labor of enslaved people benefited the city. Yet, across the city, a vibrant antislavery movement existed based among young women mill workers and churches. Learn about this complicated story that led many to resist federal law and provide sanctuary to fugitives from the institution of slavery.