LancasterHistory, in partnership with Pocket Books Shop, will welcome New York Times bestselling author Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz to the Thaddeus Stevens & Lydia Hamilton Smith Center for History and Democracy on Thursday, September 10, for the launch of her new book, The Ballad of the Fugitive William Parker.

The event comes just one day before the 175th anniversary of the Christiana Resistance, one of the most consequential acts of resistance to slavery in American history and an episode with deep roots in Lancaster County. On September 11, 1851, William Parker and a community of freedom seekers and their allies resisted an attempt to capture four men under the federal Fugitive Slave Law at Parker’s home near Christiana, Lancaster County.

Aptowicz’s The Ballad of the Fugitive William Parker tells the story of the people and communities behind the Resistance and the network of Black and white abolitionists who made their stand possible. The book has already earned significant advance recognition, including selection as a Fall 2026 Editors’ Choice by The New York Times Book Review and inclusion on The Washington Post’s list of “12 Books to Read This Fall.”

For the September 10 program, Aptowicz will be joined in conversation by Darlene Colon, president of the Christiana Historical Society and a direct descendant of Ezekiel Thompson, who participated in the Resistance. Also joining the evening will be Frank Parker IV, the great-great-grandson of William and Eliza Parker, who will travel to Lancaster from the Buxton Settlement in Ontario, Canada—the community where the Parkers ultimately settled after escaping the United States in the aftermath of the Resistance.

Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz is a New York Times best selling poet and historian. She is the author of eight books of poetry, most recently Against Vanishing (2025), How to Love the Empty Air (2018), and The Year of No Mistakes (2013), which was named the Book of the Year for Poetry by the Writers’ League of Texas. Her first nonfiction book, Words In Your Face: A Guided Tour Through Twenty Years of the New York City Poetry Slam , was named one of five Notable Books on Exploring Poetry by The Washington Post and U.S. Poet Laureate Billy Collins wrote that it “leaves no doubt that the slam poetry scene has achieved legitimacy and taken its rightful place on the map of contemporary literature.” Her second nonfiction book, Dr Mütter’s Marvels: A True Tale of Intrigue and Innovation at the Dawn of Modern Medicine (2014) spent three months on the New York Times bestseller list and was included on several “Best Books of the Year” lists, including those by Amazon, NPR’s Science Friday, Library Journal , School Library Journal , The Guardian , and The Onion’s AV Club, which called it “a nearly perfect piece of non-fiction.” She has been awarded fellowships and residencies by the National Endowment for the Arts, the University of Pennsylvania, the Amy Clampitt House, and Hedgebrook, among others. She lives in Philadelphia with her husband, the novelist Ernest Cline, and their two children. Her new historical nonfiction book, The Ballad of the Fugitive William Parker , is out this fall from Simon & Schuster

Darlene Colon is the President of the Christiana Historical Society and is a direct descendant of Ezekiel Thompson, one of the participants of the Christiana Resistance. She founded the Lydia Hamilton Smith Society and co-founded the African American Historical Society of Southcentral Pennsylvania. She has received awards from the NAACP and the YWCA, the Council for the Humanities, the Junior League of Lancaster, and the Lancaster Historical Society for her first-person interpretation of local African American historical women. Most recently, she received a Fellowship from the Lancaster County Historical Society, in addition to a Senior Fellowship from the USCTI.

EVENT DETAILS & HOW TO REGISTER

This event will take place at the Stevens & Smith Center at 13 E Vine St in Lancaster. To RSVP for this event, click “Get Tickets” below. Pocket Books Shop will be selling copies of the books at the event. To reserve a copy of the book in advance, please click here. Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz and Colon will both be available to personalize and sign books after the discussion.

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