CAMBRIDGE, Md. - Using virtual and augmented to reality to learn more about the Underground Railroad. The Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Byway on the Eastern Shore has been updated with these new features just in time for Black History Month.
With the Harriet Tubman Byway app, you will be able to experience first hand what Harriet Tubman's journey looked like in the 1850s at sites in Dorchester County and Caroline County.
The app features a virtual and augmented reality experience for four sites, High Street District/Bayly House, Stanley Institute, Bucktown Village Store, and Jacob and Hannah Leverton. The experience also includes audio from a narrator, a Harriet Tubman re-enactor, and other people from that time.
"We're always looking for new things to engage visitors. People come back over and over because they're so inspired by this place,” said Julie Gilberto-Brady, Manager of the Heart of Chesapeake Country Heritage Area.
The Bucktown Village Store, “is the spot where Harriet Tubman was in the store, hit in the head with a weight and influenced her for the rest of her life,” said Gilberto-Brady.
There are people in scenes that you can click on and learn their stories.
"There was a diverse population at the Bucktown crossroads. There were free plantation owners, there were free white families who did not own slaves, there were free black families, there were free black families that did own slaves!” said Gilberto-Brady.
The app also allows you to see and hear holograms in real time, like one of Lizzie Amby, a slave who was planning to escape.
The self-guided experience can be done at any time, all in the hopes of deepening visitors' connection with the local history that had nationwide importance.
"We provided the information and we worked with consultants, historians from this area, we had old maps, we had old documents, so we could recreate scenes as they would have looked in Harriet Tubman's time,” said Gilberto-Brady.
If you have the old app, delete it and download the updated app, because the platform has changed to support this new feature. The Harriet Tubman Byway is available on the iPhone app store and Google Play.