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          I just opened and finished building my first hotel 15 years ago to this day. My wife Julia said I should buy this journal and write about my life.

          Well hello, I’m Barney Ford. I was born a slave. In this state of Virginia, in 1824. Life was hard getting up early on hot summer days doing my master's farm work. Feet always swollen and hurt. Never enough rest. I guess I was hard headed I have the scars to show for it. 

          Then when I turned 18 I decided it was time to be free. So I was really happy to see that my owner hired me out as a waiter on a Mississippi steamboat. It was a good job, not much hard labor. I was treated better than I ever had been. One day while I was at work a man from Canada told me about the Underground Railroad, and told me how it worked. So after some long thinking and prayer I decided to leave this life and start a new one.

          Those nights were long and hard running non-stop. Sleeping in trees, never knowing what my next day’s fate would be. One night as I was running, almost at my new home in Chicago, I heard a noise in the bushes. I thought for sure I had been caught, when I ran right into something as stiff and tall as a tree. As I looked up I saw a man that was the same color as me. He took my hand and we ran together until I was finally there, Chicago. This man turned out to be Henry Wagoner, who was a run-away himself. 

          Over the next few months we became best friends. He told me about the escape of him and his sister Julia. Together we learned how to read and write, which has really paid off in the long run. When I was staying with Henry I fell in love with his sister. She was the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen. She was also very kind and smart. 

          In 1848 Julia and I got married, it was the best day of my life. During this time I was a very active worker on the Underground Railroad, when I heard about the gold rush. So soon after we got married we picked up and moved to California. Before we left I wasn’t sure if I should do this, because I was a “fugitive slave” what if I ran into my master, what would happen to me, and Julia? But Julia told me that we had to go and make a new start. California was the perfect place to make money, and go into business. Julia and I decided to make this our new home. 

          In 1851, as I stated in my first entry I had just opened my first hotel, the United States Hotel and Restaurant. Since that day many of the United States' dignitaries have stayed here, from presidents to congressmen.

          But my luck soon changed, during a political dispute with Great Britain, an American ship bombarded the town messing up half the town, and destroying my hotel. Now what would I do? Well by this time Julia and I had three children, Napoleon, Sadie, and France. So now I had to think about five people instead of just two. So we decided to return to Chicago, $5,000 richer. When we got back we decided to open a livery stable. That doubled as a station for the Underground Railroad.

          Around the beginning of 1860, Julia and I sat down and had a long talk about what we should do next, and decided to head back west to Colorado to search for gold. While there we were refused a hotel room. So we ended up with the honor of staying with the famous Aunt Clara Brown. Later that week I found my place near Denver. After a group of white men found out about my good spot they came and jumped me. After I recovered from the horrible beating, I and a group of friends claimed a nice hill on the southeast of Breckinridge, Colorado. I needed someone to buy my land for me, because of the Dred Scott case decision, which didn’t allow me to own land. So I asked my “white” lawyer to file the claim in his name. 

          He thought I had a prize piece of land, so he took the land away from me. I never saw it again. Thinking back I should have made a wiser choice than to give him my hard earned money, and land. Well he didn’t find anything so I guess I won. After he and his friends found nothing he named this mountainside “Nigger Hill”. 

          After all this I moved my family back to Denver. With the money I still had left I opened a chain of hotels, restaurant and barber shop businesses. Well, I guess this is all I’ll write until next time.

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          Since that time Ford opened Inter-Ocean Hotels, in Denver and Cheyenne. One of his most famous guests was President Ulysses S. Grant. By the 1870’s he had a fortune close to quarter of a million dollars. Ford had a big impact on many people. During the Civil War he helped runaways in any way he could, as well as newly freed slaves. He had a great impact on Congress as well, helping to stop a proposed law that would prohibit black suffrage. Ford also established the first adult education classes for Negroes in Colorado. And after his death in 1902, “NiggerHill” was historically named “Barney Ford Hill” in 1964.

[Ashley Worthy]