Oct. 28, 2008 - Levi Coffin house

We took our Indiana history field trip the the Levi Coffin house on Saturday.  Levi Coffin was very active in the underground railroad.  His house was considered Grand Central Station and he was considered the stationmaster.  His family was a quaker family and they hid as many as 17 slaves at one time.  The tour guide said he wrote in his book that he estimated 1,000 slaves had been through his doors.  Here are some pictures of the house:

Picture of Levi Coffin

Mammy's Bench - used for rocking a baby while knitting or sewing.  The "gate" can be lifted off for more seating space.  (not sure I spelled Mammy correctly.)

Slaves wooden shoes

The door leading to the hiding place.  They would then place a piece of furniture in front of the door to hide the space.

Picture inside the space.  With the flash on, it looks light, but it was actually very dark in there - and cold.

Overall, it was an interesting tour about the Quakers, Levi Coffin and life at that time, in general as far has how they cooked and spent their time.

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Oct. 21, 2008 - Indiana history

Several entries ago, I promised pictures of Alex's Indiana history notebook that he is doing with the rest of the 4th graders in our co-op.  Here are pictures of what they have studied so far.

This is just the general stuff about Indiana - location, state bird, state flower, state tree, state motto (The Crossroads of America), state flag and a county map.

Then we moved on to Indians and the Mounds builders.  I still plan to add pictures for our field trips.  We left pages with pockets for brochures that we pick up during our field trips.

This is all about La Salle, the French explorer, and his journeys that brought him to Indiana (South Bend - actually, he named South Bend). 

More information about Indians - Little Turtle and Tecumseh and their battles with William Henry Harrison in the Battle of Tippecanoe.  The history behind Little Turtle signing the peace agreement that the Miami Indians would no longer fight the whites for land - an agreement that was kept by Little Turtle until his death.  However, Tecumseh and his brother The Prophet were not Miami, so they fought and lost.  Then moving to the Battle of Mississenewa, which was an attempt to remove the Indians from along the river, which was a major path of communication between American forts. 

Another pocket for our field trip.

Just recently, we talked about pioneer life - what their houses were made of, how hard they worked to feed and clothe themselves, and what kind of schools the children attended.  Alex wrote as if he were a pioneer child writing in his journal - what kinds of things he would've done during the day.   Some things were: chores, play games like tag and hide & seek, sing and go to bed.

Lastly, we talked about Levi Coffin, the president of the Underground Railroad.  As a young boy from North Carolina, he saw slaves being treated unfairly.  When he got married and had a child, he decided he did not want his child growing up in a slave community, so he moved to Indiana.  The house he moved into was right along the way of slave escape and it had rooms upstairs with no windows, so his house became a stop along the Underground Railroad.  Saturday, we are going to visit the house, so look for pictures!

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Oct. 13, 2008 - Mississinewa 1812 battle re-enactment

As part of our Indiana History field trip, we attended the Mississinewa battle re-enactment.  There is an Indian Camp, and British Military Camp an American Military camp, and fur traders and trappers along the river.  We listened to Soft Shell Turtle tell stories and sing songs.

We visited the Indian camp and went along the river to some of the fur traders tents.  Here is a picture of a beaver skin.

Then we sat to watch the battle re-enactment.

After the battle, we visited the British military camp where some soldiers explained to us how doctors treated wounds and showed us their guns and explained how they are loaded and shot.

Before we left for the day, we stopped at another French fur trader.  He explained that the French people became friends with the Indians in order to trade.  The French men also married Indian women - to help with trading.

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Aug. 22, 2008 - Indiana history trip to Mounds St. Park

Our 4th graders all visited Mounds State Park in Anderson today to see the Indian mounds.  We learned that they used the mounds to help them know what time of the year it is - or for their calendars.  Many people believe that they are burial grounds, and some are, but most where used for ceremonial purposes.  They would have "church" on the mounds.  Also, they built the mounds so that at the spring and winter equinoxes, the sun would set directly behind a smaller mound letting them know it was time to hunt in the spring or gather food in the winter.  It was very interesting.

Here is a picture of the great mound.  It looks like a hill and a ditch.  The Adena indians dug them themselves using bone and baskets.  Because of erosion, the mounds aren't near as tall as they were originally built, and the ditches used to be much deeper.  Indians today still consider these mounds sacred structures.

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