Students gather to dig up history at Canfield home

By RICHARD L. BOCCIA

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

CANFIELD — Students digging for history found something more personally valuable than an underground railroad: Real field experience.

The search was on Saturday to prove or disprove the existence of a tunnel that may have hidden runaway slaves beneath the side yard of a Canfield home.

Though the group of about 20 people found bits of glass, ceramic and metal, they did not find a tunnel.

Mallory Kimble, 15, dug next to Kaylynne Mahone, 17, for 41⁄2 hours, removing half a cubic meter of soil. The two Chaney High School students discussed misconceptions about the history of black rights in America.

“I know some people that think when [escaped slaves] got to the North they were free,” Kimble said. “They didn’t have all their rights.”

Mahone agreed. “They could come back and get you,” she added.

Mahone described the importance of local history. “This happened here, in your own backyard,” Mahone said as Stacie Cashbaugh, owner of the property, looked on. “I think being able to see it changes people’s perspectives.”

“We found something,” was the thought that raced through Mahone’s head when she hit rocks she couldn’t move.

Half a meter under the lawn, she and another student found what might be the foundation of a bygone jail. A picture from 1900 shows the jail between the old courthouse on South Broad Street and the house at 17 Court St.

The Cashbaughs paint a striking picture of history too important to forget. They produced a song that tells the story of slaves fleeing persecution along the Underground Railroad. Cashbaugh’s 9-year-old daughter, Marissa, who voices a young slave girl on the song, said the music gives her the chills.

“I just love learning about what they went through. It’s amazing,” Marissa said, remembering the slaves as she watched the older students dig in her yard.

Marissa has read about a character named Addy from the American Girls Collection of books who escapes slavery.

“In Addy’s books, she has to leave her baby sister behind,” said Marissa, who has a younger sister herself.

People should remember the slave experience, said Cashbaugh, who owns a piece of history with her husband if a tunnel is discovered beneath their yard.

“We love history. We would like to bring the past back,” she said, adding that she feels her education in high school about the struggles and survival of slaves was inadequate.

Students from Youngstown State University also got a chance to hold history in their hands at the site. Junior Justin Laufman of Canfield found what appeared to be metal bolts with washers. Or perhaps they’re door hinges, suggested sophomore Lee Bailey, also of Canfield.

“You’re the first person to touch it since the last person who touched it 150 years ago,” said Bailey as Laufman rolled the metal in his hands near a meter-square test pit they were digging in.

Laufman was surprised to find such antiquity in his “little town.”

“I’ve never really thought of its history,” he said.

Retired Youngstown history teacher Penny Wells and local historian Vincent Shivers organized the dig with YSU assistant professor of anthropology Matt O’Mansky.

O’Mansky hopes to continue the dig next summer.

rboccia@vindy.com