Photograph as originally submitted to this page in the Historical Marker Database www.HMdb.org. Click on photo to resize in browser. Scroll down to see metadata.

Photographer: Courtesy of Onondaga Historical Association
Caption: Marker detail: Weighlock Building
Additional Description: Built in 1849-1850, it is a surviving local presence of the Erie and Oswego canals, on which some African Americans worked, and others used as an escape route. After passage of the Fugitive Slave Act on September 18, 1850, among the first freedom seekers to come through Syracuse were William Harris, from South Carolina, and his wife and baby, who came on a canal boat. When the captain and others threatened to return the Harris family to slavery, William tried to commit suicide, and his wife jumped into the canal. Although both parents survived, their baby drowned.
Submitted: September 4, 2019, by Cosmos Mariner of Cape Canaveral, Florida.
Database Locator Identification Number: p491303
File Size: 3.400 Megabytes

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