Content Warning: This section of the guide discusses racism, enslavement, and racialized violence.

The nature of freedom is Gem of the Ocean’s most overt theme. Each of the characters, in their own way, wrestles with what it means to be a free Black person in America at the turn of the 20th century. Through the characters’ complex interrogations of freedom, Wilson illustrates the difficulties that Black people faced even after emancipation: They struggled to find work and housing; they were poorly treated by white Americans in both the South and the North. These hardships dominated life for many Black people in the years following the Civil War, which, by the time of Gem of the Ocean, had been over for only four decades.

Gem of the Ocean depicts the struggles of this era both through its representation of labor and housing practices in Pittsburgh and through the dire conditions for African American characters trying to leave the South. The tin mill that employs both Garret Brown and Citizen Barlow is emblematic of the racism that Black people faced in the North. Although legally free, the workers are subject to unfair and exploitative regulations that mire them in debt.