Genet Hodder

432 Grey Street

My name is Genet Hodder. I am a heritage advocate and an active participant on the Fugitive Slave Chapel restoration project.

I’m standing at 432 Grey Street in London, Ontario and looking at an old building known as the Fugitive Slave Chapel.

I just remember one afternoon in particular that we had a meeting. We had just selected the heritage architect to help draw up plans for the addition.  And so, we all got together, anyone who had been on the committee and met. It was a steaming hot day – July 29th. And we sat in a circle out behind, under a tree. It was kind of led by John Rutledge, the architect, and he just wanted to go around, everybody say what their hopes were for the chapel. Everybody had these beautiful ideas about what should be done with chapel. Most of which were tied up in the concept of chapel is a learning place – promoting, talking about slavery, programming that might include slavery as it exists today, and it does in parts of the world, even in our own country.