Sunday, February 13, 2000
Freedom Center evolving
Design now incorporates slave jail
BY DAN KLEPAL
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Inside and out, the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center is shaping up as much more than a lifeless museum.
Although design concepts continue to evolve for the $90 million center, some elements are taking shape.
The museum will be three buildings, located between Vine and Walnut streets on the riverfront, connected by glass walkways. The center building will hold a “story theater,” where enactments and plays will bring to life past struggles for freedom.
That building also will hold one of the museum's key elements — a wooden jail that was used to hold slaves en route to farms throughout the South. Visitors will have to walk through the pen to get to the other exhibits.
Ed Rigaud, president and chief executive officer of the Freedom Center, said he hopes the pen will have the same type of emotional impact as the railroad car featured in the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. The car was used to transport Jews to concentration camps.
“We want to touch people's hearts as well as their minds,” Mr. Rigaud said.
The pen is located on the farm of Ray Evers, just east of Germantown near the Mason-Bracken County line, about an hour from Cincinnati.
Mr. Evers, a contractor who has owned the farm for 25 years, has agreed to give the museum the pen if it rebuilds the tobacco barn that houses it.
The pen will be located on the fifth floor of the museum's center building.
“That is such a strong piece, the intent is to have people come up grand stairway and have that piece right in front of them,” said Tad Lupton, project manager for Blackburn Architects, an Indianapolis firm that is designing the museum.
The Freedom Center's purpose is to celebrate the cour age of the Underground Railroad, a secret network that aided slaves seeking freedom.
About 60 percent of the design work is finished, with the final plans expected to be approved in April. The museum is scheduled to open in 2003.
In addition to exhibits and the “story theater,” the museum will have an auditorium in the east wing that will seat 350 people around a sunken stage.
Of the $90 million being raised for the museum, half will be used for construction. The rest will be spent on exhibits, programs, design fees and a $10 million endowment.
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