In 1858 Sojourner Truth was making a speech in rural Indiana when proslavery members challenged her to strip to the waist to prove that she was a woman. Protocol of the time dictated that ‘ladies’ were never to publically address a crowd. Black women were not consider ‘ladies,’ or rather members of the cult of true womanhood, anyway. At the close of the meeting, Dr. T. W. Strain, the mouthpiece of the slave Democracy, requested the large congregation to ‘hold on,’ and stated that a doubt existed in the minds of many persons present respecting the sex of the speaker, and that it was his impression that a majority of them believed the speaker to be a man. The doctor demanded that Sojourner submit her breast to the inspection of some of the ladies present, that the doubt might be removed by their testimony. There was a large number of ladies present, who appeared to be ashamed and indignant at such a proposition. Confusion and uproar ensured, which was