All aboard Athens County Underground Railroad
Volunteer group offers tour of hiding spots
Published: Monday, October 6, 2008
Last Modified: Monday, October 6, 2008, 2:10:25am
Before the Civil War, many Southern Ohioans worked secretly as conductors on the Underground Railroad, concealing runaway slaves in hidden rooms, trap doors and even wagons full of vegetables.
Volunteers from the Multicultural Genealogical Center in Chesterhill, Ohio, give tours of the Underground Railroad in Athens and its surrounding area.
The center began working with United Campus Ministries, 18 N. College St., to bring the tours to Athens last year, said Ada Woodson Adams, center president and a guide on the tour.
Groups meet at United Campus Ministries. Transportation is provided with the tour cost of $20. The eight-hour tour takes participants through Athens County and into Morgan County to see stops on the Underground Railroad.
The Underground Railroad was a network of safe places that abolitionists used to help runaway slaves escape to freedom, said Nancy Aiken, a tour guide and member of the center’s board.
Southeast Ohio had many Underground Railroad stops because the region was close to the Ohio River — the border between slave states and free states, said Deanda Johnson, coordinator of OU’s African American Research and Service Department.
The region was a hotbed of abolitionist activity and the rural area made it easier to hide slaves, Johnson said. No one knows for sure how long it existed, but the Underground Railroad was at its height in the 1830s, Johnson added.
Adams became interested in the Underground Railroad when she and her late husband visited a stop in Millfield.
“… People wanted to know more about the Underground Railroad and the role Athens and the surrounding county play,” Adams said.
As Adams began to research more stops, she realized that the history of the Underground Railroad was related to the history of the region.
“We don’t get to talk about the Underground Railroad without talking about the history of the area, who’s living where and who’s related to whom,” she said.
Adams and the other members of the center have documented several Underground Railroad stops in the Athens area, but there are still many possible stops that have yet to be confirmed.
To verify that a place was once an Underground Railroad stop, the building must be the appropriate age, and the people who lived there had to be sympathetic to the abolitionist cause, Aiken said. The center uses maps, tax records, census information and local stories to authenticate new sites.
“(There’s) still a lot of research to be done,” Adams said. “Athens itself is not documented the way it should be.”
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 Sara C. Tobias / Chief Photographer / st939605@ohiou.edu Quaker Meeting House, Chesterhill This meetinghouse was built in 1839 and is still used today for church services. Slaves did not hide here, but Quakers in Chesterhill used the meeting house to discuss their anti-slavery beliefs. Individual Quaker families were conductors, often hiding slaves until it was safe to send them to the next stop. |  Sara C. Tobias / Chief Photographer / st939605@ohiou.edu The Coonskin Library Exhibit, Amesville This building holds a museum about the Coonskin Library. The traveling library was founded by a group of settlers who traded animal furs for books. Ephraim Cutler, one of the first people to house the library in his home, was the son of Manasseh Cutler, one of the founders of OU. Ephraim Cutler helped establish the Underground Railroad in Southeast Ohio. |  Sara C. Tobias / Chief Photographer / st939605@ohiou.edu The Underground Railroad tour group rests after walking up hill to the Henman’s Cave site in Chesterhill. The cave was used as a hideout for runaway slaves while traveling through Southeast Ohio. This cave is difficult to see from the road, which made it a good place to hide slaves. In 1838, one Underground Railroad conductor hid 12 slaves here. |
 Sara C. Tobias / Chief Photographer / st939605@ohiou.edu Sally Kozma, 91, talks to the Underground Railroad tour group. Kozma lives on the land that once was home to the Weethee Academy in 1861. Daniel Weethee was an abolitionist and owned large amounts of land in Millfield. Kozma and her husband lived in the original Weethee Academy building until a fire destroyed the house. The Multicultural Genealogical Center, Chesterhill This building is in the process of being restored so the center can use it. The house was used as a stop on the Underground Railroad, but the hiding place was destroyed during a previous renovation. | |
