Untold stories of freedom: A journey through the North Star Underground Railroad Museum

Tour of sites planned for Juneteenth

By Tom French

Like much of Black history in the Adirondacks, the North Star Underground Railroad Museum in Ausable Chasm is hiding in plain sight, just 100 yards from the Chasm entrance.

Established in 2011, the museum illuminates a broad expanse of history in the Adirondacks from the War of 1812, through the antebellum years and Civil War, to more recent events. Multiple personal stories and artifacts, including leg irons found under floor boards in the town of Ausable, chronicle the North Country’s part in the Underground Railroad and highlight its continuing role as a “Gateway to Freedom.” 

The museum was founded by Don and Vivian Papson, long-time educators. Vivian was the first Black teacher in Shaker Heights, Ohio, prior to moving to the North Country with Don in 1984. 

Located in the former home of Herbert and Harriet Estes, the building doubles as the Town of Chesterfield Heritage Center. Herbert was the superintendent of the Ausable Chasm Horse Nail Works. Remnants of the foundations can be seen near the falls behind the Ausable Chasm Welcome Center, and the museum includes an exhibit about the Estes family.

From war to freedom: Tracing centuries of stories and struggles

During a tour for retired teachers in the fall of 2023, Jacqueline Madison, president of the North Country Underground Railroad Historical Association (the organization that oversees the museum), explained that even though the house was not built until the 1880s, Herbert Estes was a Union soldier imprisoned in North Carolina’s Salisbury Prison. “He kept a diary, and because he survived, he was asked to talk about his experiences to Congress. He read the entire diary. You can go online and read it.”

Visitors to the museum are greeted with a “Freedom Timeline.” It outlines the arrival of the first Africans forced into slavery in New York in 1626, through July 4, 1827, when the state abolished slavery (with the caveat that women were still enslaved until they turned 21 and men until 25). From there, it traces history up until 1870, when Black men were given voting rights via the 15th amendment. 

Learning about Adirondack pioneer John Thomas

One centerpiece of the museum is an object theater about John Thomas. In addition to narration, video, and sound, actual artifacts on a small stage are spotlighted during the presentation.  Enslaved in Maryland, Thomas escaped in 1840 to Troy and then to the Adirondacks after his first wife and children were sold. After meeting Gerrit Smith, a wealthy abolitionist with large holdings of land, Thomas was gifted 40 acres near Loon Lake as part of Smith’s scheme to provide property to African American men so they could vote. 

After arriving, Thomas moved to Bloomingdale and purchased 50 acres that he eventually enlarged into 200 acres. Thomas died in 1894 and is buried, along with his second wife, near the front of the Vermontville Cemetery, an unusual placement for African Americans at the time, but perhaps demonstrating the respect Thomas garnered in the community. 

According to the presentation, Thomas’s neighbors confronted slave catchers looking for him. “The slave catchers had a choice: Leave or be killed.” 

Descendants of Thomas still live in the area. A brook near Loon Lake, site of Thomas’s first 40 acres, was recently renamed the John Thomas Brook, and an historic marker was unveiled in 2023.

Other stories of note

The museum does not restrict itself to only the African American experience. One display features the Chinese Underground Railroad – the result of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. Hundreds of people entered the United States from along the northern border. A “Chinese Jail” was even built at Port Henry due to overcrowding at the Plattsburgh Jail. Most of the prisoners were eventually discharged because they had a lawful right to remain in the United States.

Recognizing that the North Country is still an underground route for human migration, a photo exhibit documents events along Roxham Road, a well-known route into Canada for asylum seekers until 2023 when a loophole in a US-Canada treaty was closed, but the episode shows that, for many, the North Country is still a “Gateway to Freedom.”

The downstairs of the museum is filled with artifacts. interpretive panels, videos, and thematic art such as sculptures, paintings, and quilts reflecting African American history. Madison utilized a map to show the various routes through the North Country used by the Underground Railroad. Contrary to suggestions in Russell Banks’ historical novel “Cloudsplitter,” runaway slaves probably did not use Indian Pass, but skirted along the edges of the Adirondacks – up the Champlain Valley from the Albany area and maybe along the western flank through the Black River Valley.

Madison explained the many facets of African American history in the Adirondacks. Nathaniel Platt, a founder of Plattsburgh, was a slave owner. Keeseville newspaper publisher and abolitionist Wendell Lansing was so vocal, he was “run out of town” for six years. Frederick Douglass spoke at the Baptist church in Keeseville, and Solomon Northup, author of the 1853 memoir “12 Years a Slave,” was born in Minerva.

According to Madison, Stephen Keese Smith, a Quaker and family namesake for Keeseville, was “perhaps the most well-known abolitionist in this area.” Smith hid and helped transport runaway slaves to Noadiah Moore in Champlain. Moore had a factory in Canada where he sometimes employed the newly freed people. Smith was hampered in his efforts by a neighboring Methodist minister who threatened to turn Smith in, but Smith was friends with the sheriff, who always gave notice before he searched Smith’s property.

Juneteenth tour and event

Smith’s farm still exists today and is part of a Juneteenth Colors of Freedom Tour, sponsored by the museum and over a half dozen other organizations on June 22. The tour will feature various Underground Railroad sites before ending at John Brown Farm Historic Site. Highlights for the event include music by the Plattsburgh State Gospel Choir, speakers such as Amy Godine, author of The Black Woods: Pursuing Racial Justice on the Adirondack Frontier, children’s activities, and a barbecue. Adirondack writer Neal Burdick, a great-great-grandson of Smith who has contributed items to the museum, will also be presenting at Smith’s farm.

More information about the event can be found on the museum’s website.

The North Star Underground Railroad Museum, an all-volunteer operation, is open from mid-May to mid-October on Fridays through Sundays. It is also open on June 19, regardless of which day it falls. The Museum is available for private tours by appointment (email [email protected]) throughout the year. Admission is free, but donations are accepted.