Ernie Suggs, writing in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (paywalled; Apple News+ link):

In 1860, an enslaved man named Sheppard Peek was listed among the possessions of William Peek, a white man in Crawfordville.

His value was placed at $1,400.

On another surviving document, Sheppard signed his name with an X.

More than a century and a half later, Sheppard’s great-great-granddaughter, Keisha Lance Bottoms, was elected governor of Georgia.

Bottoms is the first Black woman to be elected governor in America’s 250-year history. Following this week’s elections, she becomes one of only seven Black Americans elected governor, joining L. Douglas Wilder (Virginia, 1989), Deval Patrick (Massachusetts, 2006), and Wes Moore (Maryland, 2022), plus three elected alongside Bottoms this year: Byron Donalds (Florida), Aaron Ford (Nevada), and David Crowley (Wisconsin).

(Remarkably, the United States has never seen more than one Black governor serve at a time. Following this election, there will be five simultaneous Black governors.)