UGRR Network to Freedom
The National Park Service is now taking comments on the Old Slave House application to join the Underground Railroad Network to Freedom program. To make a comment click on the link and scroll down the page to the Illinois sites being nominated. There you will find the abstract of the application and a link to a comment page.
Like I've said before, it's a bit counterintuitive to be nominating a kidnapping station to a freedom-loving Underground Railroad network, but when Congress passed the law creating the program, they told the Park Service to use the broadest definition possible. That definition includes opposition sites like the Old Slave House as the last standing Reverse Underground Railroad station still standing.
If by now you are reading about the Old Slave House for the first time, the original owner of the house kidnapped free residents of color and sold them into slavery, participated directly in slave trading and according to various accounts used the third floor attic of the his plantation manor - Hickory Hill - as a slave jail for his kidnapped and captured victims.
The Sisk family operated the site for 70 years as a private residence and a public museum. The last owner retired and closed the site in 1996 and the state of Illinois purchased it in 2000 for a state historic site. So far though no one has given the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency enough money to operate it.
Open it NOW! Friends of the Old Slave House organized last summer and offered a plan that could reopen the site very quickly using admission fees for operating revenue. Click on the link for the updated plan.
If you would like to read more about the research and the full text from the application it's online here on IllinoisHistory.com.
A much more interesting account and goes even further in depth about the house will come out later this fall in a new book called Slaves, Salt, Sex & Mr. Crenshaw.
One thing to remember about the application is that it only deals with the Old Slave House/John Crenshaw events/stories that relate directly to the Underground Railroad program. It doesn't deal with all the other history, including the role of slavery at the saltworks, Robert "Uncle Bob" Wilson and slave breeding, and Crenshaw's other, more legitimate, business ventures.
IHPA agreed to allow the house to be nominated. The NPS encouraged me to nominate it as a first step. If included in the network it doesn't mean that we will get to reopen the Old Slave House the next day, but it will help our future efforts to save the site.
Please take the time to give your opinion on the site. Click here to go the page with the information on all the sites being nominated this round.
I want to thank everyone in advance for their support. We'll get this site reopen yet.
The National Park Service is now taking comments on the Old Slave House application to join the Underground Railroad Network to Freedom program. To make a comment click on the link and scroll down the page to the Illinois sites being nominated. There you will find the abstract of the application and a link to a comment page.
Like I've said before, it's a bit counterintuitive to be nominating a kidnapping station to a freedom-loving Underground Railroad network, but when Congress passed the law creating the program, they told the Park Service to use the broadest definition possible. That definition includes opposition sites like the Old Slave House as the last standing Reverse Underground Railroad station still standing.
If by now you are reading about the Old Slave House for the first time, the original owner of the house kidnapped free residents of color and sold them into slavery, participated directly in slave trading and according to various accounts used the third floor attic of the his plantation manor - Hickory Hill - as a slave jail for his kidnapped and captured victims.
The Sisk family operated the site for 70 years as a private residence and a public museum. The last owner retired and closed the site in 1996 and the state of Illinois purchased it in 2000 for a state historic site. So far though no one has given the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency enough money to operate it.
Open it NOW! Friends of the Old Slave House organized last summer and offered a plan that could reopen the site very quickly using admission fees for operating revenue. Click on the link for the updated plan.
If you would like to read more about the research and the full text from the application it's online here on IllinoisHistory.com.
A much more interesting account and goes even further in depth about the house will come out later this fall in a new book called Slaves, Salt, Sex & Mr. Crenshaw.
One thing to remember about the application is that it only deals with the Old Slave House/John Crenshaw events/stories that relate directly to the Underground Railroad program. It doesn't deal with all the other history, including the role of slavery at the saltworks, Robert "Uncle Bob" Wilson and slave breeding, and Crenshaw's other, more legitimate, business ventures.
IHPA agreed to allow the house to be nominated. The NPS encouraged me to nominate it as a first step. If included in the network it doesn't mean that we will get to reopen the Old Slave House the next day, but it will help our future efforts to save the site.
Please take the time to give your opinion on the site. Click here to go the page with the information on all the sites being nominated this round.
I want to thank everyone in advance for their support. We'll get this site reopen yet.
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