Ancient Ohio Trail - Real and Virtual Visits of Earthworks
Seip mound Ohio - For scale, see children
Explore Ancient Ohio
Ancient, Native American Indian architecture, made of earth, saturates the Ohio Valley. Much of it was obliterated by settlers (admittedly, many of the earth mounds were covered in trees and were overlooked; others were removed without respect unfortunately). That said, much remains. My family visits these sites ~annually; I and wanted to share some of the resources we use to plan day trips for: hiking, exploration, appreciation of past cultures, and inspiration...at places like:
Many sites have small museums associated with them (Sun Watch and Fort Ancient have very nice ones). Many others have been incorporated into rest stops (i.e. Seip Mound), parks, or are hidden in plain site within our cities. Planning a trip was once complex, but now online mapping and conservation efforts have provided interactive tools. The Ancient Ohio trail tool works great. Follow the link and select a city or road you want to travel and it will mark out the earthworks and museums. Not sure which ones to go to? Then check out the below virtual tours enabled in part by the CERHAS (The Center for the Electronic Reconstruction of Historical and Archaeological Sites (CERHAS), part of the University of Cincinnati's Design and Archictecture program. These are beautiful, realistic tours that have been integrated into the museums. Check portions of them from their YouTube.com channel:
