HOW TO GO
What: Escape on the Underground Railroad
When: 7 to 9 p.m. Saturday
Where: Governor Bebb MetroPark, 1979 Bebb Park Lane, Okeana
Cost: $10
More info: (513) 867-5835 or www.yourmetroparks.net
Learning history is typically a lot more fun if you can immerse yourself in the human drama instead of staring at pages of names and dates. That’s why the Escape From the Underground Railroad re-enactment has been one of the Great Miami Valley YMCA Camp Campbell Gard’s most popular programs since the 1980s.
“It’s usually the favorite thing (the kids) do,” said Camp Campbell Gard program director Darren Corns. “It’s the thing they remember most and they always ask if we still have it. It’s very memorable and powerful. We have 3,000-4,000 kids go through it every year.”
Although Camp Campbell Gard does this program every summer, it’s expanding to the Governor Bebb MetroPark this weekend for the first time.
The re-enactment allows kids to play the parts of fugitive slaves traveling the Underground Railroad under the guise of a traveling choir. Throughout, they will be escorted by a conductor, and have interactions with abolitionists who help them while slave hunters try to capture them and send them back to servitude. Although it may sound like history meets a reality show, the events of the re-enactment are predetermined.
“There’s a point where the fugitives come upon a cabin that may be a safe house,” Corns said. “They’ll see a red bandanna hanging, and a lit candle in the window, which are the signs of a safe house. Two people are sent to the door, just in case they’re mistaken and the rest can get away, to give a password, but (for the re-enactment’s purposes), it is a safe house. The abolitionist lets them in, and through their conversation, they learn about the risks abolitionists took to help runaway slaves, where the punishment was a $1,000 fine and six months in jail. Eventually, a ‘nosy neighbor’ will get suspicious, and the abolitionist will have to move them on.”
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