Six Acres and No Mule

As I lay suspended somewhere between disbelief and a dream, I try to make sleep the final part of this evening. But my ancestors, those with textured back and many runaway miles tattooed on their psyche, refuse to allow me sleep. I’m lying in a house built in the 1850s.

Let me apologize, I’m not being completely transparent. I’m in a house that was built by abolitionists who not only risked their privilege by speaking out against the unjust institution but were also bold enough to use their home as part of the Underground Railroad.

This 10-room piece of historical art is owned by Kristen Kitchen, a 5-foot, 0-inch African American historian who restored this house to museum quality. She now operates it as a thriving bed-and-breakfast in the College Hill community of Cincinnati. College Hill is known for its abolitionists heritage.

Kristen purchased Six Acres as it is affectionately named (as an ode to the original plot of land) a little over a decade ago. The house sat unkept for some time, and it was in complete disrepair. There were missing floors, vacant staircases, stripped walls, nothing but the unsettled thoughts and stories of runaway ancestors remained intact. Kristen, charged by an understanding of the ancestors instilled in her and her siblings by their mother who was also a teacher, took on the mammoth project with a sense of purpose that channeled the spirit of Harriet Tubman and the many others who risked it all to own what was rightfully theirs: freedom.

And now with the birth of sunrise, Kristen with her magnificent smile and pixie haircut greets every guest with a home-cooked breakfast after they have either been rocked to sleep by the ancestors of kept awake by the thoughts of what used to be.

Why can’t I sleep in this most peace place? Well, Kristen with all her conviction and surety was able to salvage the third floor hiding place where runaways were tucked in dangerous times. In the middle of the dingy, aged wood is a perfectly carved circle that resembles hallowed ground. In fact, it was and still is hallowed. This space is where the Creole voodoo doctor, who was married to a white abolitionist, would come to pray with the runaways. Tonight, it seems as if her spirit and the ancestors want me to know that Kristen has saved something sacred. And, I am crying and listening.

W. Mondale Robinson
828.261.5552
wmondale@conyersinstitute.org
Twitter: @williamrobinson
“We must busy ourselves with the work of equity” wmr