Kansas Territory, May 26, 1856

Owen Brown shook his father awake and begged him to quiet his brother Fred, most reasonably. The nine men camped here had completed their bloody work only hours before. Five of the loathed slavers lived no more. The swords used for the slaughter, washed mostly clean of blood, lay in the wagon bed under hay. Proslavery fighters were likely already hunting for the righteous killers.

Fred, in predawn silhouette atop a nearby slope, waved a stick overhead, seeming to continue last night’s battle, now with an unseen opponent.

“Son?”

Fred’s tongue was fat and busy in his mouth. On an inbreath, he made a sound that could have been the bray of a donkey. He swung his “sword” and bashed a tree trunk.

John Brown felt the dismay of a loving and long-suffering father. Always a puzzle and a worry, Fred agonized and gloried uniquely. Some careless-tongued people had spoken of spiritual possession. But John Brown, who was sometimes mocked and scorned for his own “communications,” would have none of that. He knew Fred was a righteous boy, an ardent believer in human decency who had every intention of participating in worldly matters on the Godly side. Yes, he was sometimes overtaken by…well, who could say? By shadows. By figments. By stubborn distractions within the mind.

Fred swung his stick again and bellowed, pinching the words, so he was hard to understand. “Justice,” he might have said. “Eternity.” “Godspeed.”

John Brown seized Fred by the upper arms. Fred’s wild, dark strings of hair flopped about.

“Quiet!” John Brown commanded. He whispered loudly, hoping not to waken everyone. Tall, slim Henry Thompson, who was standing sentry, watched in silence. “You are making terrible noises. You were dreaming?”

Fred saw his father clearly then. He shook his head to wake himself completely, then looked up toward the scanty treetops. “Yes, I guess that was a dream.”

“Well, you need to stay awake now. Stay calm and quiet.”

“Calm,” Fred repeated. He seemed to focus his attention on a spot among the clouds.

“The enemy will be looking for us. We want to know they are near before they know of us. So, we need to be quiet. Very quiet.”

“Yes, Father.”

He held Fred at arm’s length.

“My boy, my boy.” Tears gathered. Sometimes these father’s feelings were all too much. “I don’t want to have to send you away.”

Fred looked into his father’s eyes and attempted a smile. Then the attempt succeeded and he grinned, and father and son embraced.

*

“I have found my cabin in ashes,” said August Bondi, friend and supporter. “I am ready to fight.” John Brown welcomed Bondi into the camp. He was among those who had held back two nights before and not taken part in the murders. He was a perfect recruit, one more among the many whose eyes were opening to the need for violent response to the advocates of slavery. Bondi was a lean, quick-moving man, notably deft with a pistol. John Brown knew Bondi had fought for freedom in Austria in 1848. Like John Brown and his family, Bondi had responded to Horace Greeley’s urging in the New-York Daily Tribune to move to Kansas Territory to fight slavery.

Mid-morning, this tiny Northern Army, some on horseback, others by wagon, broke camp and traveled the miles to the Brown family settlement. The warriors smelled the stink of fire before they saw the scraps of tattered tents and the two now roofless structures. John Junior had made the walls of the larger hut from bundled prairie grass compressed between vertical posts. The grass was burned away to black wisps. Only short stubs of the posts remained. The bed where John Brown himself had slept two nights before was now exposed to open air. Some yellow clumps flapped in the mud, the sorry residue of John Junior’s books. The pigpen and corral were broken open. A few of the animals wandered nearby. Son Jason’s home, a good distance off, survived only as waist-high log walls and a stone chimney.

There were no people here. John Brown’s sons John Junior and Jason and their families were missing. Commander Brown felt eyes follow him as he took in the destruction of his family’s homestead. He turned away from the others to conceal his smile, which he knew could disconcert those not living in the Knowledge, as he was now compelled to do. His vision of the terror and destruction which lay ahead never really left him now. He knew the scope of the suffering and the inevitability of great bloodshed. The proud and terrible masters of slavery would not yield their domination to Christian appeals or the simple progress of civilization toward greater decency, as many in this time wished and dreamed.

He had led the opening battle as it must be fought: fiercely, suddenly, taking every advantage of surprise. Many would condemn him for this. He was ready for their scorn. He had joined a privileged handful who had killed so others might be freed: Nat Turner, Oliver Cromwell, Toussaint L’Ouverture.

He was proud thus far of his achievement and that of his Godly posse. He was especially proud of his sons Owen, Oliver, Fred, and Salmon and his son-in-law Henry Thompson. And he reserved some judgment. He would test all of these men. Holy adventure lay ahead. He would learn what they could bring to the fight.

*

Owen shouted a warning. The soldiers of the Northern Army vanished among the bushes and trees. John Brown, well hidden, revolver in hand, watched a new man ride in among the ruined cabins and flapping scraps of tents. He recognized O. A. Carpenter. John Brown advanced into the clearing and greeted his ally and friend.

“Your boys John Junior and Jason are getting rough treatment,” Carpenter said. “Pate is responsible.”

John Brown could have allowed a grunt of disgust to pass his lips. Instead, he maintained a sober silence. Virginia-born rich boy Henry Clay Pate now called himself “Captain” and raced about with a mounted militia of proslavery volunteers, their avowed purpose to snuff out the influence of John Brown and all those who believed in human freedom and dignity.

“Pate put the torch here,” Carpenter said, looking around John Brown’s family’s homes. “He plans to empty Prairie City.” The village of Prairie City was on the road between the free state settlements at Lawrence and Osawatomie. If Pate held it, he would cut off communication between the antislavery communities.

“That would just be wrong,” John Brown said.

They would ride the twenty miles to Prairie City. They had horses they had taken from their victims, plus James Townsley’s lumber wagon and team together with the pony Theodore Weiner rode. They were short saddles. John Brown sent Fred to the front on a fine roan in an excellent saddle, hoping a prominent place might stabilize his mood and his behavior. Sons Owen and Oliver followed next after Fred, riding bareback. Salmon rode beside his father, also without a saddle. The others came on behind.

Near the Marais de Cygnes River (English speakers called it Meridizene), they came upon a large camp of federal soldiers. Unsure of these soldiers’ loyalties and mission, John Brown Stayed back to avoid being recognized. He tugged his dusty, round-topped, broad-brimmed hat close around his ears and pulled a bandana up beneath his now white-whiskered cheeks. He told his men to bunch their horses and present a side view to make their numbers look small. He sent Fred and O. A. Carpenter ahead. The group’s captain emerged from his tent.

“Who are you?” the uniformed captain asked. Fred laughed, gently. The captain winced.

Carpenter told a pretty story. “We’re farmers. We heard proslavery men were going to attack Osawatomie, and we came to help out. But we didn’t see ’em. We’re heading back home.”

“Yeah?” the captain asked. “And what’s with him?” He nodded toward Fred.

“A bit touched is all.”

The captain grunted, then let John Brown and his fighters pass. They rode slowly through the federal camp and forded the stream beyond it. Once out of sight and earshot of the federals, they moved quickly. Before dawn, they made camp in virgin woods near Ottawa Creek beside a fine spring.

*

Amiable, handsome free state man Captain Samuel T. Shore came alone into John Brown’s camp. Sam Shore was a tall, strong-chinned, pale man who spoke rapidly in a high, clear voice. His thick black hair had just the beginnings of pale streaks like pieces of straw mixed in.

John Brown respected Captain Sam Shore as a gentleman and an ardent opponent of slavery, but reserved some of his possible admiration of him as a fighter. Sam Shore was “smart” and reliable. But he lacked ferocity. He was one of the many “good” people who had counseled caution and what had amounted to retreat after the slavers burned the town of Lawrence just a week ago. Owen in an overly loose moment had referred to him as “Damn” Sam Shore. John Brown’s personal policy of not judging his allies harshly was becoming increasingly difficult to follow. He could never forget that, in a fight, some people ran toward the battle. Others ran away.

“Looks like so-called Captain Pate is going to attack Willow Springs,” Shore said.

“He would do that. And what about the local men?”

“A timid bunch,” Shore said. “We won’t get much help from them.”

John Brown felt his own face knot painfully around the cheeks and jaw. He loathed cowards! He saw Sam Shore’s eyes tighten.

“They need you,” Shore said. “Since the killings last week, you have become their example of a proper fighter.” Embarrassed by this flattery, John Brown looked into himself and saw nothing. “That can’t be true,” he said.

“You have made a reputation,” Sam Shore said.

John Brown’s face and neck heated. Yes, he had led his fighters with their slashing blades. But his personal contribution had been fitful and confused. He could not be the hero who was required. There must be others who would serve as models for those who would join the fight. He was not qualified for this role. He was not worthy.

A soaring “wahoop” drew both men’s attention. Sam Shore reached for his pistol. The shout came again, echoing weirdly among the scant trees. John Brown said, “My boy Fred. He’s…”

Sam Shore met his gaze and nodded sympathetically. He looked down to where the toe of a threadbare sock stuck out between the separated sole and upper of John Brown’s right boot.

“We need supplies of all kinds,” John Brown granted. “Bring me food. Bring me boots,” he said, wiggling his exposed big toe. He looked Sam Shore in the eyes and said, “Bring me hats.” John Brown laughed. “Worn-out hats are okay. Ten or more.”

*

John Brown retreated from the company of his volunteers to a small area apart among some trees with a kneeling place he had selected for his deeper prayers. He turned his mind away from all thought of the future struggle. He turned his mind away from Fred’s increasingly freakish yelling and all it might portend.

He faced upward toward the vast, open, clear blue of the summer sky and eased away all remaining thought. As the human aspect diminished, the spirit spread beyond the body and the known world. Past the heights of the trees, the limits of space dissolved. His body was a thread or a feather or just a flickering area of warmth.

Distinct sensations of joy heralded full divine contact: tingling in his palms, tightness of his tongue, a complete happiness that overflowed and spilled about him as a magnificent fountain.

God appeared. At first, more than a thousand feet tall, like a living mountainside. Then, in a different land of tall trees and sunlit sand, God took on human scale. A small, gray-haired, rheumy-eyed Black man approached on a donkey with the reins across one open palm as though his fingers were sore and he preferred not to grip hard. The man opened a sack at his waist and removed a handful of coins, which he counted.

The man then considered John Brown. He passed over a folded paper. John Brown instantly recognized the map of the peninsula where the Shenandoah and Potomac Rivers joined in Virginia, where the federal arsenal was located at Harpers Ferry.

As John Brown’s fingers closed around this map, the ground beneath him softened and curled and lit up in flame. Around him, crops burned. People screamed and ran. Flames roared. Buildings collapsed. He saw Richmond burning and Washington, D.C., burning. He was frightened. He was happy. He was living in the Knowledge.

*

He poked his fork into a roasting pig haunch, which dripped and caused crackling in the small fire. The horses were staked nearby, saddled and ready for quick departure. Rifles and swords were stacked in the open area. A few armed men lay on red and blue blankets. Others stood guard.

Fred waddled slack-jawed into camp. Some men bowed or turned away. Fred’s long, thin hair bounced around his shoulders. His big bottom was a pair of melons within ill-fitting, lopsided pants that he was not managing well. With Fred came a man in good trousers, a white button-collared shirt, and a cranberry-colored necktie. John Brown recognized James Redpath and welcomed him. He knew the clever and worthy Redpath from an antislavery meeting last spring in Topeka and from his byline in antislavery newspapers: the St. Louis Democrat and the New-York Daily Tribune.

“Is this John Brown?” Redpath asked.

“Now a wanted outlaw,” John Brown said, a well-considered boast. A reward had been posted for his arrest. White whiskers now obscured his angular cheeks and chin. He smiled. It was best his appearance continuously change. John Brown offered Redpath bread and pork and creek water dressed up with ginger and a bit of molasses, and they took a sitting place by the fire.

“I encountered your son Fred in the forest,” James Redpath said. “He is agitated.”

“That he is.”

“He says there’s been some killing.” Redpath opened his notebook over his knee and raised his pen.

“We face a momentous situation,” John Brown said. The words he spoke now would likely soon appear widely in print. He would say little and suggest much. He skirted possibly self-incriminatory details of recent events. The war to end slavery, he insisted, was at hand.

*

More volunteers joined the force. One reported Pate’s men had burned August Bondi’s cabin, then ripped up Weiner’s store and taken most everything. Sam Shore came back into the camp on foot, smiling, carrying a good-looking saddle. “I have the wagon a quarter mile off, as close as we could get. I need help bringing things up.”

John Brown called Fred to come along. Sam Shore climbed into the wagon and brought out a pair of excellent boots, properly sized. Under the wagon cover, John Brown saw four saddles and a pile of hats. Most of the hats were round, broad-brimmed. Among them, he found a yellow bonnet, which he left in place in the stack.

“This is good,” he said. He knew to ask no questions about where these and the other supplies had come from.

“Pate and maybe fifty Missouri men are gathered on the Santa Fe Road,” Sam Shore said. “Some of them raided Palmyra and got away with rifles and powder. Our side did not resist.”

John Brown listened in silence. The passivity of free state people sickened him—the insides of his chest felt emptied and repacked with putrid matter. An interior stink he alone could smell set him apart. He clamped his jaw. If he opened his mouth now, he would moan horribly, an infantile outpouring most unsuitable for “Captain Brown.”

*

Sunday, June 1, 1856

At Prairie City, John Brown and his fighters found Sam Shore had recruited almost twenty volunteers to join them, which cheered up everybody. Some of Shore’s men carried Sharp’s rifles, good for long distance, even more encouraging. John Brown’s men would be fighting up close. They had only short-range muskets and pistols and swords and knives. John Brown was not dismayed by this situation. He respected superior weapons, of course, but he always believed close fighting was most effective.

“Pate’s men took prisoners last night,” Sam Shore said to Captain Brown. He spoke openly, so any of the group could hear. “They kidnapped a Dr. Graham, the Baptist preacher Moore, and an Englishman named Lymer on the open road. This outrage has helped with the recruiting.”

“And rightly so,” John Brown said. “We will attack at dawn. Just now, I’m going to hear the good tidings.” An itinerant preacher would speak that evening.

The preacher drew most of the townspeople, with some listeners inside a building, others overflowing onto the street. John Brown, cheerful now, was inside enjoying the sermon when August Bondi raced in, kneeled beside him, hooked his arm, and whispered loudly in his ear, “We caught two slavers running through. They know what happened to John Junior and Jason.”

“Tell me! No, I will have them tell me.” John Brown ran out with a backward glance. He would apologize to the preacher later, if he could.

He confronted the two captives in the closet at the back of the gray-boarded Main Street store that now served as a jail. The men were bound and seated. They both wore their uniforms sloppily, open shirts and no bandannas. One had his pant leg ripped open and some blood showing on his leg. They smelled of whiskey. These diminished soldiers seemed strangely less than human, their faces twisted.

“What do you know of my sons, John Junior and Jason?” he asked the two.

“Captain Pate has ’em, the loudmouth one in irons,” the more deep-voiced, sloe-eyed prisoner said.

These words brought pain behind the eyes and deep, more purposeful concentration to John Brown. “Where is your Captain Pate?”

“Where you’ll never catch him. Pate’s brilliant. Somewhat mad.”

“Mad?”

The man chuckled, affecting a great knowingness. His companion moaned, rolled forward, and vomited onto the floor.

*

During the night, John Brown and Sam Shore led their warriors on a quiet walk four miles to Black Jack, a boggy area named for its blackjack oaks. At daybreak, the thirty-odd freedom fighters lay silently in the grass. A deep ravine separated the free state men’s position from Pate’s. Just three hundred yards on, Captain Pate had more than fifty men clustered about their three covered wagons on the stretch of upsloping prairie. The wagon covers slapped gently in the morning breeze. Behind the wagons were their tents, behind the tents the horses and mules.

This arrangement of forces pleased Captain Brown as it conformed to theories he had developed from reading of battles in Europe. Sam Shore’s men might fire their rifles from a distance. John Brown’s men, with only short-range muskets and pistols and swords and knives, could slither unseen in the tall grass until they were close, then attack at very short range.

At this uniquely unsuitable moment, Fred seemed to invent a new form of clumsiness. He stumbled as though drunk, though that, of course, was impossible. No liquor was allowed in the camp. Afraid Fred’s fumbling and random speech would betray them to the enemy, John Brown personally conducted him away from the battlefront to where the horses were staked.

“I want you to guard the horses,” he said without great confidence he could keep Fred out of trouble. “Keep them ready.”

At first full light, John Brown’s well-coached men advanced in pairs, moving quickly from one hidden location to the next. John Brown spun the hats to various spots among the men in the waving grass. When he came to the yellow bonnet, he perched it, too, atop a waving stand of grass.

On the upslope that stretched to Pate’s position, John Brown took his small group of fighters to the right, descended into the ten-foot-deep ravine that passed around the enemy troops on this side. Sam Shore took his larger group to the left.

The morning sun clearly lit Pate’s spot. For a long, quiet interval, John Brown easily made out the three covered wagons and the men about them. The sight was sweet in John Brown’s eyes. Like a painting or a photograph, the image seemed to have been prepared just for the purpose of highlighting his target.

Pate’s lookout shouted, “The abolitionists are coming!”

Cursing, both obscene and blasphemous, came from Pate’s fighters. John Brown had a powerful distaste for such loose talk but was pleased nonetheless when these sounds of offense and gross irreverence erupted among the enemy. Such expressions of disrespect weakened his opponents and focused the passion and strength of his allies.

He saw much activity around Pate’s three wagons, men taking up their rifles and two extending and raising telescopes. As the moment of combat came closer, he experienced a wonderful serenity. He watched from a reservoir of great stillness. The patience of the eternal was available to him, not so with his restless volunteers. He signaled with his down-waved hand for them to remain quiet and low in the grass.

To the left side of John Brown’s group, Sam Shore sent his fighters charging up over the ravine crest toward Pate’s barricade. Pate’s men fired their rifles. On the rising prairie, one free state man was shot and cried out and fell to the grass. Sam Shore called his men back. They dragged the moaning, wounded man.

Four of Sam Shore’s men joined John Brown’s group in the ravine. The others retreated further, well out of rifle range, annoying John Brown so much, he clenched his jaw to the point of pain, then spat, an ugly habit which sadly fit the situation. He gave up the front line himself and took off chasing after the shirkers. He caught up with three of Shore’s men who had the long rifles.

“Your job is here!” he said, pointing toward Pate’s clot of wagons. His voice was stern as cement.

The three men faced John Brown with rifles at their sides. “We are farmers, sir,” one said.

“No longer. God has made you riflemen.” The man blubbered. “Forget all that. Stay behind those trees. Face the enemy. Aim carefully. Aim low. Bring down Pate’s horses and men.”

Responding to clear orders, the three calmed and focused on their assignment. They fired their rifles. Enemy fighters screamed and fell. Pate’s men shot two of the round hats. John Brown was pleased. The yellow bonnet then jumped and flew. He laughed out loud. He sent his son Salmon and August Bondi to circle around behind Pate to cut off those now trying to escape to their rear.

Somebody shot Henry Thompson through the side. He sank, bleeding, and lay down in the grass.

A terrible shout and the pounding of galloping hooves reached John Brown from behind. Fred stood in the stirrups atop the big horse. He passed the front line and raced across the grassy divide toward Pate’s soldiers.

In the open land, Fred let free from his chest and throat and jaw the sound of the underworld shifting. Knives scraping bottles and the cries of children drowning emerged as a weird, inverted gargle that opened terrifying inner vistas in all who heard it. At the horrible noise, John Brown shrank back into his hiding place in the grass.

On Pate’s side, a tall, slim, blue-eyed volunteer, dazzled by such noise into simplicity, lowered his rifle and stood tall in the morning sun. A free state man leveled his weapon and shot the stupefied boy-in-a-soldier suit, who crumpled and died.

Fred dropped from his horse, turned his backside to the enemy, bent over, and let loose toward Pate’s slack-jawed men, a fart John Brown recognized as worthy of Satan himself.

Pate’s men ceased firing.

“You’re surrounded!” Fred told them. “You are all going to die.”

John Brown leaped up from his safe position and chased Fred about the open field. “Fred! Follow me back.” Fred stared wild-eyed at his father, as though the old man had just dropped from the sky. “Fred! Frrrrrredddd!”

After several turns around in the battlefield, Fred accepted his father’s plea, and they raced back together toward safety.

For almost eight minutes, the only sounds were shirring grass and rustling leaves, stirred by gentle gusts.

The tallest and skinniest of Pate’s lieutenants crossed the field, his rifle hoisted vertically with a white flag tied to the barrel. Ahead of this soldier walked their stumbling, blinking hostage, elderly, white-bearded Doctor Graham. Blood ran visibly across Doctor Graham’s whitish shirt and down the torn right leg of his trousers.

“We seek terms,” the lieutenant said. Perspiration glued his shirt tight against his chest.

Captain Brown laughed. This burble of humor might be unseemly, but he didn’t care to restrain himself. He had prepared mind, body, and spirit for sustained struggle. Now, the victory was handed to him, the battle largely unfought. The reason was simple. Pate and his men were      scared! Fred’s shriek had opened their minds to fearful speculation. They imagined a great antislavery army around them. John Brown allowed himself to enter into this great imagining that had disabled his enemy. He pictured the slopes and ravines around and behind himself populated with large numbers of friendly forces. He showed his teeth. “We have you greatly outnumbered,” he said, trusting God to blink as he delivered his self-serving mistruth. Pate’s lieutenant shuddered. His chin pressed down so as to almost touch his breastbone. “I will speak only to Captain Pate.”

The sweaty lieutenant made a proper about-face and returned to his commander, leaving Dr. Graham a grateful man, free to move on to friends and comfort and relative safety in the town.

The grassy slope remained silent. The open space could be a giant trap. But John Brown tired of worrying. After several minutes, he presumed upon Pate’s honor. With one of his men, he walked across their little valley of death up the slope toward Pate’s wagon barricade.

Regardless of whatever shortcomings as commander might plague him, pink-cheeked, curly-haired Captain Pate had summoned up abundant pluck. He strode chest thrust forward from his wagon barricade, threw his head and his long, dark curls back, and, chest conspicuously swollen with his put-on show of pride, proclaimed, “I represent the full authority of the United States government.” He seemed to be looking at the middle of John Brown’s forehead.

John Brown laughed once again. “You are mistaken, Captain. You manifest the force of the Devil himself. And we demand your surrender.”

Pate blubbered. John Brown smiled. If Captain Pate was now a pea, John Brown was a vast stretch of this beautiful prairieland. He raised his pistol and aimed at Captain Pate’s chest. Was he really prepared to shoot Captain Pate in his helpless situation? No.

The heavy pistol remained steady in his outstretched hand.

The free state forces then collected their enemy’s weapons. They took twenty-three prisoners, including Captain Pate. Four of Pate’s men lay dead in the field, many others wounded. Henry Thompson, O. A. Carpenter, and six other free state men were wounded.

*

Owen Brown went scouting and brought news John Brown’s daughters-in-law Wealthy and Ellen and his young grandsons were safe in Osawatomie with his missionary half-sister, Florilla Adair, and her husband, Sam, and thank God for that.

At camp on Middle Ottawa Creek, John Brown earnestly instructed Pate’s misguided men on the evil of their ways. God, he explained, estimates equally the worth of the soul of each human individual. And God loves all. Redemption is always possible. These men, though they had, in their miseducated condition, fought in support of Evil, could repent and recover the path of righteousness.

Three days after the battle, Colonel Edwin Sumner arrived in the camp with more than fifty well-armed cavalrymen on horseback, interrupting class.

“Your commander?” Colonel Sumner asked. John Brown stepped forward without identifying himself by name. “President Franklin Pierce and Governor Wilson Shannon intend to pacify Kansas Territory. My orders are to break up all armed groups.”

Colonel Sumner freed all prisoners and seized all weapons. John Brown attempted to negotiate freedom for John Junior and Jason, without success. Despite the outstanding warrant for John Brown’s arrest, Sumner left him and his men free in their camp.

*

The New-York Tribune of June 13, 1856, brought to John Brown the annoying whine of Henry Pate’s apology for his poor performance in battle. In reaction, he wrote up his own account of The Battle of Blackjack, and Horace Greeley published it. John Brown presented to the reading public the volunteer fighters against slavery as he would have them: fearsome and unstoppable. He adorned his portrait of confident, almost swaggering, “Captain Brown” with fearlessness and conviction, presenting a man he did not, in fact, know well, but whom he would hope, in the coming time of great necessity, to embrace in fullness. Having reflected thoroughly on how his manner of rendering the battle in print might influence public support for the antislavery cause, John Brown chose to omit all mention of Fred’s extraordinary shriek and its likely decisive effect.

About the Author:

J.W.M. Morgan is writing a series of linked stories about the inspiration of the abolitionist John Brown. His stories have appeared in The Courtship of Winds, Azure, Diverse Voices Quarterly, The Montreal Review, Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, War, Literature & the Arts, and other magazines. He lives in Oakland, California, where he teaches 
and mentors people who are developing basic skills. http://www.jwmmorgan.com/

*Feature image by John Silliman on Unsplash