Day of History and the Trail

Morning sunshine on the Ohio River

 Thursday
We headed out to New Albany, IN. There is a lot of history in this area on both sides of the Ohio River because the river was the dividing line between the southern states and the northern states during the unrest in the union during the late 1800’s. This eventually led to the U.S. Civil War that lasted for 4 years.

 In New Albany they have an exhibit called Ordinary People – Extraordinary Courage. The exhibit is a tribute to all of those who ‘helped’ people along the Underground Railroad. Some of them were ‘free blacks’ living in northern free states, some were Quakers (who didn’t believe in slavery), many were white abolitionists, and some were slaves who had already made their way to freedom and came back to help others. There were a lot of newspaper articles, documents of sale of slaves from one person to another, receipts from slave auctions, newspaper ‘want ads’ advertising rewards to runaway slaves (rewards ranged from $20-$100 – depending on circumstances. This is interesting when you think that Harriet Tubman’s reward for capture was $40,000!!) Also in the newspapers or article, there was a lot of political commentary from both sides on the state of things during that time. One newspaper editor was very pro-slavery and believed residents in free states should be helping to apprehend runaways. There were court documents of ‘friendly judges’ who refused to allow slave catchers or residents turn in runaways. The information was all about the Underground Railroad but very specific to this area which made it very interesting.

One of the most interesting stories we heard was about Jacob Cummings. He was a runaway from a southern plantation. He met an abolitionist in the south who helped him to make a plan to escape. His journey took him through forests, swamps, safe houses; hiding in barns, houses, the false bottoms of wagons. Slave catchers tried to re-capture him twice. The first time he tightened his hands into a fist when they tied him up and when he thought it was a good time, he slipped from the ropes and got away. He was re-captured, tied up and forced to walk behind the slave catcher’s horses from Charlestown, IN to Jeffersonville, IN. This is about 33km and the route that Audrey and I took on Wednesday! We didn’t realize that we went almost the same route as Jacob! The best part was, when he got to Jeffersonville and the slave catchers were trying to take him back over the Ohio River to the southern states, two abolitionists, saw them and called the judge and he demanded that the slave catchers let Jacob go! I think he was the ‘friendly  judge’. They helped Jacob get on his way – the farther from the Slave States the better but he wasn’t safe until he reached Canada and settled in Amherstburg, ON. Yeah! I am glad this story had a happy ending – I know not all of them did.

Baseball History
We left New Albany, IN and drove to Louisville, Kentucky.  We went to the Louisville Slugger Museum. We were able to look at the exhibits. There were a lot of famous players in baseball who used Louisville Slugger bats and a lot of players use them today too – including Derek Jeter and Canada’s Joey Votto.

There was a neat exhibit (see pic) called ‘Breaking Barriers’. There was some history of black players playing in the MLB – including Jackie Robinson and there was a whole part of the exhibit dedicated to women in baseball and softball. Very cool!

There was a pitching machine simulator that shows a video of a pitcher throwing a pitch and then a pitching machine throws a ball 90mph. It hits a padded catcher and you can stand behind a plexi-glass window to watch it. I got Audrey and Rod to stand there and pretend they were umpiring with me – they both flinched when the pitch came and Rod walked away and said I was crazy to stand back there and the batters are crazy to stand there too! J

 After the museum, we toured the actual bat factory. We saw how they used to make every bat by hand on a lathe taking from 20-30min for each bat. Then we saw how technology has changed that and they can produce a bat in about 30 seconds. Then they showed us the ‘special bat lathe’ that makes the MLB players bats which cost $89 each. They had a number of the MLB player bats there for us to see. On the end of each bat there is what they call a ‘bat nub’. It is the part that is hooked to the machine that spins the bat, holds the bat for shaping, polishing, stamping, etc. They gave us a ‘bat nub’ from a MLB player’s bat and our own Louisville Slugger Mini-Bat. :-D


Louisville Slugger Factory



Big Pappy's (David Ortiz) game bat.



Cal Ripken's game bat.



These are bats on plaques outside the museum. The one plaque honours Honus Wagner. One of the first 5 players to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame! He recently had his baseball card from 1900 sold for almost 3 million dollars! (It was owned at one time by Wayne Gretzky!). Josh Gibson - is considered the 'Black Babe Ruth'. He was a big home run hitter.

Outside the factory and museum - the area around the base of the trees is shaped like a baesball plate. :-) 

Our next stop was to Slugger Field which is home of the Louisville Bats baseball team – AAA team to the Cincinnati Reds. Outside of the stadium is the statue of Peewee Reese who is from Louisville, Kentucky. (See picture) Peewee Reese was a teammate of Jackie Robinson the first year Jackie was in the major leagues – the first year any black player was in major league baseball. He silenced the aggressive angry crowd when he walked across the infield and put his arm around Jackie during the game. He also refused to sign a petition started by other team members trying to get Jackie removed from the team. I have read a book about this to some of my students at school called “Teammates”. I like to ask them if they are going to be ‘one of the crowd shouting’ or be Peewee and step up and make a difference. I am glad Pewee made a difference. J Special thanks to Audrey and Rod who drove me across town in Louisville just so I could get my picture taken with the Peewee Reese statue.

Rod who has been our most excellent roadie, picking us up and dropping us off when needed! Rod is a big horse racing fan and we are in Louisville, Kentucky! So we went to Churchill Downs which is home of the Kentucky Derby. We did a tour there, it was pretty interesting. In “Millionaire’s Row” during the Derby, the seats and table only cost about $60,000! Wow! A general admission ticket –no seat – you can just walk around is $42. He also talked about the horse that inspired the movie Seabiscuit and about the Triple Crown Winning Horse Secretariat – which after he passed away, they did an autopsy and the horse had a 22 pound heart! A regular horse would have an 8-12 pound heart! That is crazy. I didn’t really know very much about horse racing and it was very interesting.

Friday

Distance Travelled via truck: 1001km
Distance Travelled via bicycle today: 27km
Distance Travelled via bicycle TOTAL:  60m

Today, Audrey and I headed out on our bikes again. We travelled about 27km from Saluda, IN to almost Carroltown, KY. On route, we passed Milton, Kentucky! (See pic), both Audrey and I taught in Milton and that is where we met.

During our trek today, we had some interesting moments. The first part of our journey had us travelling through a rural part of the area. Many people had dogs. Audrey and I were chased by not one, not two, but three dogs today!! It was the closest we will come to feeling like fugitives running from bloodhounds!

As we were making our way towards the Ohio River, we had a steep decline. VERY STEEP decline, even with my brakes on, I was still going about 45km per hour! We were going so fast that Audrey lost her sweater from her bike pack. The hill was SO steep that we decided we didn’t need to climb back up to look for it! J

View while crossing the bridge.

View of the Ohio River from the top of the bridge.

Also during our trip today, we crossed the Ohio River. It was a bit perilous, as there was lots of traffic and the first half of the bridge was uphill (lol). I thought of my friend Lynne while at the top and glanced down towards the water – YIKES! She doesn’t like going over bridges in a car but I decided I am not super crazy about doing it on a bike. J

While crossing the river, I also thought of how many fugitives crossed that river with hope in their hearts for a better life as a free person. That river must have seemed a million miles long during their crossing.

Info about safe house in Carroltown

 In the museum we went to, it talked about the experience of crossing the Ohio River like Crossing Jordan. Many fugitives felt that their plight was like the Israelites escaping the Pharaoh in Egypt, lead by Moses. I didn’t know this. It also makes sense to me now why Harriet Tubman’s nickname was “Moses”. They felt she was the same, leading her people away to safety and freedom.

Currently we are travelling to a small town just outside Cincinnati, Ohio. We will camp there over the weekend and pick up the Freedom Trail from there.



Safe house in Carroltown