Maps aim to connect cyclists with Underground Railroad history
March 03, 2007MARK F. BARNETT
Associated Press
LOUISVILLE, Ky. - History can be healthy.
That's the message two groups hope to get across to veteran and beginner bicyclists with a set of maps intended to get riders closer to a painful chapter of American history.
The last three sections of the Underground Railroad Bicycle Route were recently released, completing a path from Owensboro, Ky., through Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York, and eventually ending in Canada.
The first sections trace the route from Mobile, Ala., across to Mississippi, through Tennessee, into the Land Between the Lakes in western Kentucky and north to Owensboro.
The Adventure Cycling Association and the Center for Minority Health at the University of Pittsburgh began a partnership on the route with the aim of encouraging blacks to seek out their cultural history and improve their health. It's also seen as a way to erase cultural tensions and diversify the demographics of the bicycling set.
"As people experience this route, they are going through small towns and neighborhoods, meeting people whose stories will intrigue them and they'll be able to share their experiences," said Ginny Sullivan, new routes coordinator for ACA.
"Over the years people riding on our routes have experienced what they call the 'true America," Sullivan said. "They find people opening up their doors and hospitality of communities. Strangers become allies."
"Riders will go to houses along the routes and people are willing to share water, a place to camp or a place to cook... It brings cyclists to the real America," she said.
While there is no singular route that slaves took to freedom, the cycling group wanted to choose a route representative of the freedom trail that would also wind through areas of historic significance.
Mobile was chosen as a starting point because it once served as an entry point for slave ships. The end point of Owen Sound, Ontario, which was founded 150 years ago, was home to blacks escaping Civil War-era slavery.
The maps provide detailed directions, lodging information and other services cyclists might need along the way. Field notes in the maps also give the traveler historical context for some of the spots along the way.
The route is now at least four years in the making. There are also spurs planned that will connect different regions to the original route. One spur is planned from Erie, Pa., to Pittsburgh, with the hope of eventually connecting to Washington, D.C.
Members often fill out feedback cards when they've traveled a route, suggesting changes or adding new information that is helpful to riders, such as points of interest, water, food or shelter stops, and roadway construction.
"Our routes are always evolving," Sullivan said.
The group has also contacted libraries along the route to let them know that riders may come through their doors seeking a dry spot or relief from the heat.
"Cyclists like to use libraries to check the Internet to keep in touch with their home and e-mail," Sullivan said.
This spring, ACA will sponsor a trip from April 14 through May 31, taking a group of a little more than a dozen riders through the roughly 2,100-mile route.
Dallas and Joyce McKenzie researched the route for ACA by traveling the proposed route in a recreational vehicle and by bicycle. They trekked about 125-150 miles a day, taking extensive notes on necessities for riders like places to get a hot shower, bike shops, low traffic roads and highways with shoulders.
The Lenexa, Kan., resident said a bicyclist can expect to travel about 75 miles a day on the route. McKenzie, a retired American history teacher, says the route is meant to give riders a sense of the route a slave may have taken. "We tried to follow the river as best we could," McKenzie said, "and let the riders encounter most of the landmarks."
He notes that Kentucky will give riders the type of adventure ACA members are seeking. "The scenery is fantastic, history is plentiful, and the challenge certain to bring out the best in any serious cycling tourist," McKenzie said.
The bicycling group has approximately 42,000 members and is the largest nonprofit cycling group in the United States. It began in 1974 and was given the name Bikecentennial by its founders when they formed the nonprofit that is now based in Missoula, Mont.
One of those members is Barry Zalph. As the executive director of Bicycling for Louisville, Zalph confirms he's never owned or leased a car. He began lobbying for the route to go through the Louisville area when he heard ACA was embarking on the Underground Railroad route. Zalph's group is a bicycling advocacy and education nonprofit that also conducts research and technical advising to state and local agencies.
"Louisville was an important connecting point into the northern states," said Guy Washington, a regional coordinator with the National Park Service's Network to Freedom who has worked with ACA on the project.
Through his work with low-income and minority children, Zalph knew his group could benefit from the route passing nearby. His group encourages low-income youths to not just bike their own neighborhoods.
"The beauty of the Underground Railroad route, passing as close as it does, gives us the opportunity to create local loops and routes for local riders to stick their toe in the water," Zalph said.
He said he wants to "expand cycling beyond the college-educated white guys over 40 group."
And that's part of the strategy of both groups involved in the project.
Mario Browne, a project coordinator with Center for Minority Health, works in community engagement, health promotion and education. The center saw the partnership as an opportunity to work on a broad scale in helping promote minority health issues.
"We see it as a part of our mission overall to eliminate health disparities between races," Browne said. "Minority communities experience a higher incidence of mortality from diabetes, cardiovascular disease and hypertension."
Bicycling just 30 minutes a day can help ease those problems with minimal cost.
"Small steps can lead to big rewards," he said. "Cycling is something that people can do basically year round at a gym or in their basement... You don't have to be Lance Armstrong to do it and see the benefits."
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