Book excerpt: "For 400 years free blacks and people of color played a critical role in every region, colony, and nation in the Americas. This is the first reference book to cover the contributions, impact, and legacy of this unique and varied group. The two-volume Encyclopedia of Free Blacks and People of Color in the Americas includes articles on all major events, issues, and concepts relevant to the free black community in the United States from the colonial period to the Civil War era, and in the rest of the Western Hemisphere from the late 1400s to the late 1800s, when emancipation became universal."--Book cover.