JH:"It really seems to me that Quindaro has more history than any place in the county, we were here from the very beginning, it's one of the oldest places."

JH:"My family came to this area through the underground railroad. My ancestors escaped from slavery and came to live in this area."

JH:"We want to record more of the family histories. We haven't got all the documentation, but other narratives will probably be added at some point in time. I want to get the story of Quindaro told."

JH:"There were eight families who came over, my mother's family, my family name was Monroe. There were the Monroe's, Banks, Grigsbys, and Creeks. They all still have descendents who live here in Quindaro."

JH:"During really cold weather, the river would freeze over, and they walked across the ice. They hid in stocks of corn and basically lived outside waiting for the time to cross the river. You have to remember the slave master always told them that the area across the (Missouri) river, (Kansas) was filled with hostile Indians who would eat them alive! This was supposed to keep them in captivity for fear that their life would be taken. But they came anyway. After they came across the river, I've heard the story told, they were so afraid of the Indians that when they were eating breakfast, and the Indians would make noises, my ancestors would run off. The Indians would come in and eat their breakfast and drink their coffee. Then my ancestors realized that was a spoof and they stopped letting the Indians do that."

JH:" My great, great, grandfather, Robert Monroe is buried at the Quindaro cemetery at 38th and Parrallel. He was born in 1828 and died in 1882. The cemetery was segregated of course. There was a little strip (far west and south corner of the cemetery) about 15 foot wide by about, oh, maybe 50-60 yards, and that's the black section of the cemetery. On the far west edge."

"When my great, great, grandfather came over here from Parkville, he settled in Sortor's hollow, over off of Emmon's drive. Before the Civil War, the slave catcher's hunted us and when they came to Quindaro, they camped in Quindaro park. One afternoon my great grandfather's sister, (Robert Monroe's daughter) went up Happy Hollow road and was carried off by the slave catchers. All that would come up when my family talked about their life in Quindaro. Especially the little girl that got caught going up Happy Hollow road. The slave hunters took her back and got a reward for her. That's why the old folks always used to say we should stay close together and not stray from our families. "

"And my people would talk about the ancestors taking a skiff across the (Missouri) river to Parkville. For the sake of walking so far, they'd go right over to Parkville in the skiff and buy whatever they needed for stores, and come back to Quindaro. The stories I heard mentioned that there were still relatives over there in Parkville. Now they were probably quite old people. And now I see the logic myself. They were too old to make an escape so they stayed and made their home there. After slavery was abolished my great grandfather and our family continued to visit them."

"I remember my grandfather refers to them going across the river to a party in a skiff, and he made a joke about a woman, Emma Duncan, of rather large proportions. She was in the skiff, and water splashed up in the boat, and she screamed and passed out. And the man said "everybody set down, cause if anything happens, only one gonna be saved." See my grandfather couldn't swim so he asked, "who's that?", and the man said "me cause I can't save all you people." My grandfather thought, 'Damn, I can't swim either!' But you know they had a life style that was .. you know my grandfather was born in 1886. So, he was going across the river at the turn of the century, to see relatives over there that were pretty dear to him."

JH: "I know that they [Sortors] were abolitionists. And they managed to help escaping slaves. When they would runaway, the Sortors would help them. I know my grandfather did work for them later, he did some washing. There was generally a good feeling about the Sortors. We had one of the Sortors, Judge Norman Sortor, come to our family reunion with his wife, [Beulah Sortor, who at age 81 vividly remembered this reunion]. I knew that we had a family member that broke his leg falling off a horse, and I hadn't known who had taken him to the hospital, but it was Judge Sortor. He had an old Model A, and drove him to the hospital. I'd heard my mom (Helen Hope) tell that story a million times, but didn't know who had taken him to the hospital till that reunion" (Hope, 1999).