About this episode
In celebration of Juneteenth, we revisit the final episode of Into the Depths with National Geographic Explorer Tara Roberts. Tara is inspired by the stories of the Clotilda, a ship that illegally arrived in Mobile, Alabama, in 1860, and of Africatown, created by those on the vessel—a community that still exists today. The archaeologists and divers leading the search for the Clotilda lay out the steps it took to find it. As Tara talks to the living descendants of those aboard the ship, she admires their enormous pride in knowing their ancestry, and wonders if she can trace her own ancestors back to a ship. She hires a genealogist and visits her family’s small hometown in North Carolina, where she celebrates the nation’s first federal Juneteenth holiday. The spirit of community she finds at the celebration, as well as the surprising results she receives from the genealogist, bring Tara a sense of belonging to a place that she never could have imagined.Want more?Check out our Into the Depths hub to learn more about Tara’s journey following Black scuba divers, find previous Nat Geo coverage on the search for slave shipwrecks, and read the March cover story.And download a tool kit for hosting an Into the Depths listening party to spark conversation and journey deeper into the material.Also explore:Dive into more of National Geographic’s coverage of the Clotilda with articles looking at scientists’ ongoing archaeological work, the story that broke the discovery of the ship, and the documentary Clotilda: Last American Slave Ship.
