By Marilyn Bauer
The Cincinnati Enquirer

A million-dollar gift to the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center from the Otto M. Budig Family Foundation will fund the moving of the 1830s slave pen from a Maysville farm to the center's new home in 2004. The money also will be used for archaeological research, preservation and associated operating costs.

"This project is so significant," Mr. Budig said Wednesday. "It carries not only the weight of the oppressive slave days but also the hope we have for a better tomorrow. I just felt it was the right thing to do."

The pen, whose rescue was completed last month, sits in an undisclosed location waiting for its resurrection in 2004. It was moved from its home on the former property of John W. Anderson following a 24-month excavation. Architectural plans call for it to be placed on the center's virtually transparent second-level atrium, making it visible inside and out.

"If the building hadn't existed, we could have forgotten," says Carl Westmoreland who heads the project. "Most people feel a disconnect when we talk about the slave trade. But the movement of a million people from Virginia as far west as Texas - in chains - underwrote the American economy."

According to Mr. Westmoreland, Mr. Budig's contribution, which was originally pledged in 1999, was essential to the preservation of the pen. It also will allow his team to continue the research that has uncovered thousands of artifacts. They include not only kitchen implements, tools and pottery, but also documents that make the history of the pen all too real.

"It is a physical manifestation of what the slaves had to go through and the hopelessness they faced," says Mr. Budig. "I just simply can't imagine any human being collared and handcuffed and taken to a place, not knowing his or her fate. I think it is important for us to remember how it was. The slave pen provides an ideal opportunity for us to stretch our imaginations."

Researchers believe the 20-by-30-foot, two-story log pen was built by Mr. Anderson to house slaves being shipped to slave market auctions in the South. When it's moved to its new home, it will be installed with video documentation of the excavation, oral histories taped from area residents, courtroom and church records and the best of the artifacts found at the site.

"You see it and you can't deny it," says Mr. Westmoreland. "We have the owner's letters talking about what he could get for this woman or that man. We even have a prospectus Anderson wrote to get investors in a business pushing `bad blacks.' "

The pen's location is being kept secret to protect it from the elements and vandalism. .

Controversy arose in 1999 when Ray Evers, the owner of Anderson farm, donated the building to the center. Some residents wanted the slave pen to stay in Maysville; others wanted Mr. Evers to open his farm as a historical "museum." And there were those who felt it should not be preserved at all.

"Throughout the process we asked ourselves, were we doing the right thing both morally and legally," says Spencer Crew, the executive director and CEO of the Freedom Center. "The answer was yes, this was the very best way to preserve the structure."

Researchers worked closely with Kentucky and federal officials to involve the community. Mr. Westmoreland says people were willing to share their recollections.

"We could not keep our history hidden in a barn," adds Carolyn Miller, president of the Bracken County Historical Society who once opposed moving the pen.

"It was time to come out and reconcile with our history,'' she says. "Unlike some other counties, which were staunchly anti-slavery, Mason County's economy was heavily dependent on slavery, and therefore those who opposed slavery here literally risked their lives."

"It's not a pile of logs," says Mr. Westmoreland. "It's a story."

E-mail mbauer@enquirer.com