You know what?
Here.
Take a look at this.
(trumpets play)
(upbeat music)
(tapping)
What're you doing?
(tapping and swiping)
What're you doing?
I think the battery's dead.
Ain't no batteries in it, give me this.
This is a book!
Sweetie, let me tell you
about a man named Henry "Box" Brown.
See, he was a slave who escaped
by mailing himself to Philadelphia in a box.
Look at this. Mhm. Here he is, right here.
Wow, that's crazy.
Crazy like a box.
(laughs)
It was a play on words.
(drums play)
Now sweetie, let me put this in perspective.
Back in the 1850s, a lot of plantation owners
liked to say slaves were happy and well cared for.
Well, tell that to the hundred thousand of them
who risked everything to escape
through the Underground Railroad.
Now, I know what you're thinking.
How did they dig all those underground train tunnels
with nobody noticing?
[Daughter] Yeah!
[Kevin] It's a metaphor.
There wasn't really a railroad under the ground.
It was a network of secret routes and safe houses
formed in the early 1800s by abolitionists
and other escaped slaves.
Like, like the great Harriet Tubman,
who made thirteen trips to the South
to personally free over seventy people.
These brave souls gave biblical names
to landmarks along the way.
The Ohio River was known as the River Jordan,
and Canada was the Promised Land.
Yep, tens of thousands of slaves
settled in the great white north.
Which explains great black folks like Willie O'Ree,
the first black player in the NHL.
And Drake.
(drum beats)
But not all slaves used the Underground Railroad.
Some went to incredible and genius lengths to escape.
Like Henry Brown.
Henry's wife and daughter were sold to another slave owner
and he never saw them again.
But it turned that heartbreak into determination to be free
by any means necessary.
(western music)
(crate thuds on the ground)
All right, 155 pounds of cigars, bound for Philadelphia.
Toss those in the wagon.
Well, I could use a little help, sir?
(chuckles)
(laughs)
That's funny (laughing)
(horses whinny)
(grunts and breathes heavily)
There we go.
(uplifting music, horse whinnies)
Soon those cigars will be free.
What, why? Something wrong with them?
Oh, no no no, they're great cigars,
Then why would they be free?
No, you've still gotta pay for them.
That's not free? What is this?
Some sort of scam?
Forget it.
(guitar twangs)
[Kevin] Brown had help from
a sympathetic white shoemaker named Samuel Smith.
[Brown] (from inside crate) Thank you again!
You're welcome.
(hammers)
Hey! You know I'm in here, right?
(western music)
All right, two hundred and thirty...eight pounds
bound for Philadelphia.
It's fine china, very fragile.
Sir, this is the U.S. Postal Service,
the finest postal service in the world.
I guarantee we will take the utmost care
with your package.
(western music)
(crate slams into pole, men grunt)
Would you watch it, doofus? Let me steer it!
(crate bumps into pole)
That was me, sorry.
(men grunt, crate slams into pole)
Oof, come on! Move it!
[Kevin] While he was in the box,
Henry wrote down his thoughts in a journal.
(crate clatters)
After twenty-six grueling hours,
the crate made it to Philadelphia.
Henry made it to a group of abolitionists,
and when he stepped out of the box,
his first words were,
"How do you do, gentlemen?" (laughs)
"I made it!"
I'm finally here.
(uplifting music)
Dang, that's pretty slick.
I mean, it was okay. I coulda beat it.
Oh, really?
Are you kidding? I woulda popped off
a quick joke that would have blew Henry's
right out the box.
Like, for instance, if I'd have said,
"Someone gonna sign for this?"
(group laughs)
"Cause I'm thinking outside of the box."
(group laughs)
"It is great to be here, y'all!"
(group laughs)
"Now, who kicked me down the stairs?"
(group laughs)
"No, seriously? Who did it?"
"Cause they need to die. Tonight."
(group laughs)
"I am killin!"
(group laughs)
I prefer Henry's line.
He has a certain understated elegance.
What? Come on. Those abolitionists were dying
in that fake reenactment.
I know what I like.
Well, anyway, Henry's plan worked, okay?
He was a free man and when word got out,
you can imagine what happened.
Henry "Box" Brown was the OG crate escape artist.
That's why we're talking about him
and not Otis "Envelope" Evans.
(envelope rips)
(western music)
(upbeat music)