LancasterHistory, in partnership with Pocket Books Shop, will host a book launch on Thursday, September 10, at The Stevens & Smith Center to celebrate the release of Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz’s new book, The Ballad of the Fugitive William Parker. Aptowicz will sit down with local historian Darlene Colon to discuss the book’s importance and how it is the first narrative nonfiction account of the Christiana Resistance and the first to unite three of the radical abolitionist communities that made it possible.

Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz is the author of three nonfiction books and eight collections of poetry. Her forthcoming nonfiction book, The Ballad of the Fugitive William Parker, is the extraordinary forgotten story of an event known in its day as “the first shots of the Civil War”—a stylish, propulsive, intimately human tale of farmers, socialites, and self-emancipated folks with little in common who came together to stand against injustice… and won.

Her previous nonfiction book, Dr Mutter’s Marvels: A True Tale of Intrigue and Innovation at the Dawn of Modern Medicine, spent three months on the New York Times bestseller list, and screenplays based on the book have won awards at the Philadelphia Film Festival, Hamptons International Film Festival, the Sloan Foundation, and the Black List. Her first nonfiction book, Words In Your Face: A Guided Tour Through Twenty Years of New York City, was named a “Poetry Book of the Year” by The Washington Post.

EVENT DETAILS & HOW TO REGISTER

This event is expected to take place in person at The Stevens & Smith Center, 13-15 East Vine Street, on Thursday, September 10, 2026, at 6pm.

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