The Hayner Public Library District is thrilled to partner with Alton City Hall to co-host “Journey to Freedom: Illinois’ Underground Railroad.” To compliment the exhibit, The Hayner Public Library District will offer several programs related to the Underground Railroad. Please take advantage of the wonderful opportunities noted below.

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Journey to Freedom: Illinois’ Underground Railroad Exhibit Opening and Reception 

Thursday, October 1, 2026, 6:00 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. 
Location: Alton City Hall

Join us for the special opening event of the “Journey to Freedom: Illinois’ Underground Railroad” exhibit at Alton City Hall. Heather Feezor from Looking for Lincoln will share some background on the individuals highlighted in the exhibit and how the exhibit came to be. Light refreshments will be served.

No registration required.

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Connie Martin Presents: Pre-Civil War Quilts: Secret Codes to Freedom on the Underground Railroad

Tuesday, October 6, 2026, 6:00 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.
Location: Hayner Library at Alton Square Mall Performance Room (Upper Level)
132 Alton Square, Alton, IL

Join Connie Martin as she tells the stories passed down to her great-Grandmother, Lizzie, of how her family survived the antebellum period through trials and tribulations, and how they used quilts that contained hidden codes and secret messages to assist abolitionists, white and Black, in guiding enslaved people to freedom through the Underground Railroad to Canada.

During this presentation, Martin shares eighteen different quilt patterns in replica quilts and refers to a book her mother, Dr. Clarice Boswell, wrote about their family called Lizzie’s Story: A Slave Family’s Journey to Freedom. Martin tells the history of the Underground Railroad, safe routes, and shares the history of key abolitionists that have been passed down to her, a sixth-generation descendant of captured enslaved Africans forced into slavery in America.

Connie Martin earned a Bachelor of Arts from Illinois State University and a Master of Arts degree from Aurora University. A retired middle school language arts teacher of thirty-two years, she honored Black History every February by teaching African American famous firsts and honoring those individuals who contributed to improving life for all people. Martin has been on the roster of the Illinois Humanities Road Scholar Speakers Council from 2021 – present.

Please call 1-800-613-3163 to register for this program.

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Songs of the Illinois Freedom Road with Chris Vallillo 

Tuesday, October 13, 2026, 6:00 p.m. 
Location: Hayner Library at Alton Square Mall Performance Room (Upper Level)
132 Alton Square, Alton, IL

Songs of the Illinois Freedom Road is a powerful new musical performance featuring the songs, stories, and struggles of the Illinois Underground Railroad. The program was developed by Looking for Lincoln to be performed in conjunction with communities hosting the exhibit. 

The show features rare first-person accounts of freedom-seekers who passed through Illinois. Highlighted stories include John and Mary Little, who traveled on foot 140 miles to Chicago, and George Burroughs, a Black Canadian who worked on the Illinois Central Railroad, where he helped smuggle escapees to freedom.

Vallillo extensively researched the subject using primary source documents such as the 1857 Slave Narratives of Canada and the WPA Slave Narratives, as well as the most recent scholarship on the subject. Vallillo combines these powerful stories with eleven historic songs that were sung by the enslaved to inspire and share knowledge among themselves. 

Always a project-oriented artist, in the early 2000s Vallillo began creating one-person shows using music as the vehicle to explore a subject or theme. His 2008 project, titled Abraham Lincoln in Song, received the endorsement of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission and the CD reached number ten on Billboard’s Bluegrass Album Chart. In 2016, his recording, Oh Freedom! Songs of the Civil Rights Movement, charted at number six on the folk charts, and the show was staged with a band and full choir at Western Illinois University. That show was videotaped and syndicated on Illinois Public Television.

Please call 1-800-613-3163 to register for this program.

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The Underground Railroad in the Alton Area with Charlotte E. Johnson

Saturday, October 24, 2026, 10:00 a.m.
Location: Genealogy & Local History Library
401 State Street, Alton, IL

Charlotte E. Johnson is an award-winning Illinois historian who has spent more than fifty years collecting, researching, and documenting local history. She will discuss the Underground Railroad in the Alton area. Mrs. Johnson is credited as both a project advisor and memory keeper in the “Journey to Freedom: Illinois’ Underground Railroad” exhibit. Her work has been featured at the Hayner Genealogy & Local History Library, Madison County Historical Society, Alton City Hall, Lewis & Clark Community College, in the Mythic Mississippi Project at the University of Illinois system, and in displays and research collections around the state.

Mrs. Johnson, who grew up in Springfield, Illinois, taught choral music in Chicago and Minneapolis before moving to Alton. She became involved with the Black Pioneers of the Alton Museum, and later with the “20th Century African American Leaders of Alton” exhibit. These contributions led to her work with the Springfield Bicentennial Commission’s exhibit “If the Truth Be Told,” and with the National Park Service and its Underground Railroad Freedom Project. Other projects include “Let the Church Say Amen: Rocky Fork Church in Voice and Vision,” the Illinois State Library’s Illinois African American Resource Guide, and the history exhibit for the Fosterburg Sesquicentennial Celebration. In recognition of her work, Mrs. Johnson received the 2021 Lifetime Achievement Award from the Illinois State Historical Society, which recognizes individuals for sustained and varied contributions to state and local history.

Please call 1-800-613-3163 to register for this program.