A lot of interesting research about the Underground Railroad is being posted by local researchers! I for one am grateful! The emerging information suggest that there were regional variations in the way that enslaved people move toward Canada, but all regions where the Underground Railroad operated had the same goal. That goal was to assist fugitive slaves by offering shelter, food and protection from their pursuers during their journey to freedom in Canada. Local Underground Railroad researcher need a place to combine and the history of the Underground Railroad in the United States.

My research covers the Underground Railroad in six southeastern Ohio counties. I grew up beside the Ohio River which is or was the Mason-Dixon Line, and the Muskingum River which was route used by fugitive slaves to travel north across Ohio toward Lake Erie to reach Canada. I have authored two books and co-authored two books about the Underground Railroad in my locality. For over twelve years I have been a weekly newspaper columnist for a local newspaper in Marietta, Ohio, THE COMMUNITY LEADER.

I have identified a number of plantations and other establishments in (western) Virginia that had owned slaves or used slave labor. My research indicates that early settlers in counties along the Ohio River in (Western) Virginia, that today is today West Virginia, brought slaves with them to help them clear land to establish their farms or plantations. I have been fortunate to identify a number of individual fugitive slaves, their owners and details about their lives and their escapes to freedom. Much of my research is on exhibit at the Belpre Historical Society http://www.belprehistory.org/ .

Other information about my research is published at http://www.seorf.ohiou.edu/~xx057/, http://www.coax.net/people/lwf/hrb_seo.htm , http://henryburke101.tripod.com/ , http://www.americanodyssey.net/, http://www.mgcenter.org/index.html, and http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~deanr/ephraim_c.htm . Type Henry Robert Burke in to your web search engine for more. Please feel free to contact me.