Today, Still’s book, The Underground Railroad, is known worldwide. According to Diane Turner, curator of the Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection at Temple, the work “is important not only for the meticulous record it establishes, but also because it demonstrates that Blacks had intellectual ability and were active participants in their struggles for freedom.”

“To keep a record of the activities of the Underground Railroad was a risk,” said Turner. “Prior to the Civil War, helping people escape slavery was against federal law.”

Now, as Temple recognizes Black Heritage Month, the Blockson Collection is helping to ensure Still’s legacy endures by digitizing and displaying his personal papers. Covering 1865 through 1899, the archive contains 140 letters and 14 photographs that are in demand among scholars and researchers. However, time and natural wear have caused some of the items to decompose. Now kept in mylar and acid-free folders, letters to his family are almost illegible, their paper deteriorating at the edges.

Supported by a $46,777 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities’ Save America’s Treasures program, the Blockson Collection will preserve the papers and related historical documents through a digitalization process, which will allow the artifacts to be viewed online by scholars across the globe.

Among the papers are letters from Still to his daughter, Caroline, a student at Women’s Medical College. Like most modern exchanges between parents with children away at school, Still’s letters encouraged her to keep up with her studies — and often
included a little something extra.

“He would routinely send $5 for her expenses, and that was a lot of money back then,” said Aslaku Berhanu, librarian at the Charles L. Blockson Afro-American collection.
“Can you imagine? Despite all that was going on around him, Still was successful at establishing a normal life for himself and his family.”

“These letters reflect William Still on a personal level,” added Turner. “His letters to his daughter are so personal, they show that he was a normal father, an ordinary man who ended up doing something extraordinary. He helped Americans of African descent have a voice.”