"For all the books currently in print about the Shakers, there is still relatively little published information about the western communities." -- Indiana Magazine of History, 1998
"Short chapters on each community are supplemented with nearly fifty maps. [I]ndispensable for anyone interested in locating Western Shaker sites." -- Communal Societies, Journal of the Communal Studies Association, 1997
"The volume's 21 chapters represent an important initial attempt at synthesizing the historical, spatial, and material development of western Shakerism." -- VAF, Vernacular Architecture Newsletter, Winter 1998
A fascinating "collection of maps and histories of better known and lesser known Shaker sites in Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Michigan." -- Ohioana Quarterly, Summer 1998
For all the books currently in print about the Shakers, there is still relatively little published information about the western communities. Sites, and the remainders of sites, are scattered throughout Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana, but less than a handful are well-known enough to attract much tourism. Boice and her coauthors seek to remedy this situation with a series of maps and essays on the major sites of western Shaker settlement. The essays themselves, reflecting the book's multiple authorship, are of varying length and degree of detail. As the title indicates, however, the detailed site maps will probably be of primary interest, both to historians and tourists. -- Indiana Magazine of History, September 1998
Historical accuracy was a key to all aspects of the book. [W]ell organized and has an appealing layout and design. [S]imply excellent." -- 1998 OAHSM Awards Program, Columbus, Ohio, Nov. 7, 1998
Maps of the Shaker West provides a detailed account replete with forty-nine maps and twenty-one histories of Shaker sites in Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Michigan. Boice, Covington, and Spence give readers insight into the establishment of Shakerism in the West in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. As part of the pioneer revivalism of the era, the Shakers sought to spread their influence across the United States with their emphasis on communal living and emotional religious services. Maps of the Shaker West chronicles the success of the movement in the frontier West and even tells of its attempt to establish colonies along the Georgia coast at the turn of the century. The authors also suggest that some Shaker activities involved participation in such humanitarian endeavors as the Underground Railroad in the late 1850s. After reading this book, readers come away with a better understanding of both famous and little-known Shaker communities and are able to put this religious movement in the larger historical context. -- The Georgia Historical Quarterly, Winter 1997
It was a thrill to receive the Educational Excellence Award from the Ohio Association of Historical Societies and Museums at the Ohio Historical Society on November 7, 1998 for Maps of the Shaker West.
About the Author
Martha H. Boice provided the research for the lesser known Shaker sites and kept the project focused on the finish line. She lives with her husband Bill in Dayton, Ohio, where she became fascinated by the number of Daytonians who were unaware of the Shaker community in their midst called Watervliet. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Ohio Wesleyan University and the University of Michigan School of Social Work, Martha's particular pleasure is getting all the puzzle pieces to fit into place. Her family includes three grown children and two grandsons who encourage her with her projects. Historic preservation and herb gardening are her two areas of expertise.
Dale W. Covington's "gift" is his ability to use his computer in creative ways, putting facts and figures together in unique combinations. Educated in the disciplines of electrical engineering and nuclear engineering, Dale earned a B.S.E.E. from Vanderbilt University, a D.A.S.S. from Manchester University [Fulbright Scholar], an S.M. from M.I.T. and a Ph.D from Georgia Tech. As a senior research engineer at Georgia Tech, Dale conducted contract sponsored research. He has written over 40 publications in the fields of electromagnetics, solid state physics, and Shakers in the west. Dale resides in Marietta, Georgia, and has a consummate interest in the Shaker outreach at White Oak, Georgia.
Richard B. Spence has been creating maps and drawings of Shaker buildings for many years. He has B.S. and M.B.A. degrees from Indiana University and augments his artistic and historic pursuits with his job as Human Resources Manager for United Air Specialists, Inc. in Cincinnati. Richard spent two years performing basic historical research for the Hamilton County Park District on the White Water Shakers. For the Warren County Historical Society, he created a panoramic sketch of Union Village which is displayed in the Robert and Virginia Jones Shaker Gallery at the museum. Richard, who lives with his wife Suzy in Cincinnati, indicates his ongoing interests are White Water and Shaker agricultural architecture.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
During the 1850s many Shaker communities acquired property at some distance from their primary sites. Although there are many reasons why this surge of land ownership might have taken place, one possibility which has not been explored is that the Shakers were part of the Underground Railroad. The urgent secrecy of the enterprise and perhaps its intentional omission in the Shaker journals make it difficult to prove this thesis. Let's look at the acquisitions.
Union Village, a stop on the Underground Railroad, began purchasing land in Clinton County, Ohio, late in 1856 from a man known as "a staunch Abolitionist." Then White Water acquired two nearby tracts in April 1857. In August of that same year, Union Village purchased another farm along the Kankakee River in northern Indiana, an area where the river was utilized to transport slaves toward Canada. Daniel Brainard acquired two small lots in Henry County, Ohio, along the Maumee River in 1824 before joining the Watervliet, New York, Shaker community in 1827. In 1857 he sold both tracts for one dollar to the Watervliet Shakers. Henry County families have an oral tradition linking their families and the Shakers in their area with the Underground Railroad along the Maumee River and the Miami and Erie Canal.
In April 1859, New Lebanon, New York, joined this program of outreach, purchasing a farm along the St. Joseph River in Berrien County, Michigan. The story that the barn, enlarged by the Shakers, sheltered escaped slaves circulates in that county.
The Shakers at Watervliet, New York, owned land in Illinois given to them by Reuben Treadway in the late 1820s or early 1830s. The farm was located near the community of Hudson. After looking over the property in 1855, the Shakers had a house and barn built there, then hired a tenant farmer to run the farm.i Underground Railroad paths crossed Illinois from Missouri and other states, focusing on Chicago and from there to Canada via the Great Lakes.
The Underground Railroad was in existence as early as 1815,ii but its activity greatly increased after the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law in 1850. That law made it possible for slave hunters to come into free states and to take blacks back into slavery. The act placed the full power of federal law enforcement behind the apprehension of slave runaways. The Underground Railroad was dangerous business and those who cooperated in the enterprise would not share information about their involvement with others. Participants might know only the next stop north, about 20 miles away. Then they would not be able to answer too many questions. Severe fines and even imprisonment were the penalty if one were caught by the authorities. The communities of free blacks were the primary source of assistance to escaping slaves, but others also provided "safe houses."
Religious communities played a significant role in transporting slaves northward. John Rankin of Ripley, Ohio, kept twinkling lights in the windows of his hilltop home overlooking the Ohio River, guiding many slaves in their eventual escape to Canada. This Presbyterian minister was fined and imprisoned for his activities.
S.W. Gilliland's home in Brown County was on the path northward beyond Ripley. He was the minister for the Red Oak Presbyterian Church, having taken John Dunlevy's place after the latter became a Shaker.iii Wesleyan Methodists, these Presbyterians, and especially the Quakers were the known driving forces in the Underground Railroad. Levi Coffin, called the president of the Underground Railroad, used his home in Fountain City, Indiana, to expedite the movement of slaves from Cincinnati to Lake Michigan. Coffin was a Quaker.iv
Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Michigan were all admitted to statehood as "free states." The Ohio River formed a circuitous and undulating path between free and slave states. Perhaps the Shakers played a role in the network of routes that developed north of this river which took slaves to Great Lakes ports or from Michigan via Detroit or Port Huron directly into Canada--and freedom.
