Saving SPRUCE HILL, 238 acres in south-central Ohio
 

Native American Earthworks & Appalachian Cove Forest

Total cost:$611,020   Balance needed: 0!!!!!
 

Wonderful News!!

A grant from Clean Ohio has just been announced as approved which will enable The Arc of Appalachia Preserve System (Highlands Nature Sanctuary) and Ross County Park District to buy Spruce Hill in full!!! The Spruce Hill land acquisition project will  be completed sometime in the summer of 2008. For the sake of history, we will leave the text below published for awhile, so that you can feel the drama that lies behind the successful saving of Spruce Hill.

Four Helpful Reference Maps

Who Were the Hopewell?

Spruce Hill Worthy Natural Area

Dear Friends,

We are asking for your creative and financial help to save Spruce Hill -- a 2000 year old Hopewell* earthworks site, a worthy natural area, and a potential World Heritage site. On June 14, 2007 the property was scheduled for public auction. Just five weeks before the auction, The Arc of Appalachia Preserve System and Wilderness East, began a last minute attempt to raise the necessary funds to purchase the property.

Ironically the stone walls that were erected 2000 years ago to define this ancient ceremonial site, apparently had enough lingering power to stop a housing development from being built inside the enclosure today. In a short period of time, we managed to raise the necessary funds for a substantial down payment. Through a combination of mortgages from Conservation Fund, no-interest loans from private individuals, and assumption of interest payments by Archaeological Conservancy, we were able to successfully pull Spruce Hill off the auction block and get it into contract a breathtaking 24 hours before the auction.

We are mounting a NATION WIDE grassroots campaign to complete the purchase of Spruce Hill, and we hope to raise the remaining balance of $353,000 in as short a time as possible. Please read why it is so important that we buy and save the property known as Spruce Hill.

(Hopewell is a regrettable but popular term for a prehistoric culture who spanned , please see explanation and apology at the bottom of this page.*)

 

Spruce Hill wasn't built in a day--but it could have been lost in a matter of minutes on the auction block. Now that we have managed to get it into secure contract, we still need to raise significant funds to complete its purchase You can help in one of two ways:

l ONE, HELP RAISE IMMEDIATE FUNDS through gifts or loans l TWO, PASS THE WORD ON TO OTHERS in your personal and professional networks. Please act quickly.
 

Coming up for sale
too fast for the National Park Service to Save.

The Hopewell Culture National Historical Park based in Chillicothe, Ohio has been hoping to incorporate Spruce Hill Earthworks into the park system ever since the 1980's. Unfortunately, time ran out for the National Park Service. This spring, when Spruce Hill was scheduled to be sold at auction on June 14, 2007, strict laws prevented the Park Service from diverting the slow Congressional process of park expansion, procedures that often take many years before consummating in a sale. The reality was -- without immediate action from the public sector -- the historically significant site would have been permanently lost – like most of our nation’s Hopewell sites before it. Fortunately three non-profits stepped up to the plate to do something about it.
 

What is so critical about saving the Spruce Hill Earthworks?

   The earthworks at Spruce Hill are nearly as intact today as they were back in 1848, when the site was described by early Ohio historians, Squire and Davis. Of the major ceremonial sites identified in the Hopewell heartland of southern Ohio, most were geometrical earthworks built in the level fertile floodplains of rivers and creeks (precise squares, octagons and circles). Of the 41 primary Hopewell earthwork enclosures that were found intact 200 years ago (the vast majority of them in southern Ohio)-- nearly every one has since been obliterated by agriculture or development.  
  Spruce Hill belongs to a category of unusual sacred enclosures known as large hilltop "fortresses" (though likely ceremonial as opposed to defensive), of which less than a dozen have ever been found of similar scale. These large hilltop enclosures are non-geometrical in shape, their walls following  the natural contours of flat-topped hills having steep sides. Spruce Hill earthworks encloses an astonishing 150 acres -- acreage which for the most part has never been investigated archeologically.
   The Spruce Hill site is unique in that it's walls are made entirely of stone. The site is furthermore unique because of the clear evidence that high-temperature fires once burned along sections of its walls. Findings of molten slag and glazed bedrock have led to controversial debates as to whether metal-smelting furnaces might have operated on the property, either in historic or prehistoric times, debates which beg for additional research. (consider googling ancient blast furnaces to tap into the controversy) Lastly, Spruce Hill lies in the same region as two lowland geometrical earthworks -- Baum Earthworks and Seip Earthworks, and is the only hilltop enclosure in the Chillicothe Hopewell heartland.  Spruce Hill is one of the nation’s most important intact archeological treasures that is currently unprotected, likely hiding the answers to many longstanding questions currently posed by Hopewell archeologists.

Why are Native American Eastern Earthwork Sites so Important?
 

The indigenous history of the Eastern North American continent IS THE MOST UNDER-RATED AND UNDER-APPRECIATED story in American history. Archeology and anthropology in the western half of the United States have often taken precedence in the hearts and minds of the American public. In the East, Native American earthworks were usually destroyed before our culture awakened to their importance. Of the many people inhabiting the Eastern Forest, the culture knows as the Hopewell, living between 2,200 and 1,500 years ago, were one of the most artistic and geographically influential to have ever lived on the entire continent. 

    If those of us living in the East are ever to establish a deep sense of place and pride in our landscape, we would do well to commit to recovering and honoring the history of our land, and the long history of people who lived upon it.

Spruce Hill as a Natural Area
Located in the Arc of Appalachia
Ohio's most intact bioregion
   Spruce Hill lies in the five county area of southern Ohio called the Arc of Appalachia. This geographic region contains the densest canopied forests left in all of Ohio. The Arc region contains more zoological and botanical diversity than any other equal sized region in the state. Spruce Hill lies in the exceptionally scenic ARC region known as Paint Valley -- ten miles west of Chillicothe. Together with the nearby lower Scioto River, Paint Valley has more prehistoric mounds and geometric earthworks than any other place in Ohio and quite possibly the world.

    Spruce Hill is not only an earthworks site, but a natural area worthy of protection, including over 70 acres of wild-flower strewn Appalachian hardwood forests, open fields sheltering rare grassland birds such as Grasshopper Sparrows and Henslow's sparrows, and a swamp white oak wetlands where native salamanders, wood frogs, and wood ducks breed. Click here for more information on Spruce Hill's natural history.

Long term management and ownership -- linking nature and history preservation together

     The long-term vision for Spruce Hill is to manage the site as a nationally significant historical and nature preserve, offering public access via hiking trails. The plan is to formally contract the National Park Service's expertise in stewarding, managing and preserving the historic earthworks. Conservation easements and deed restrictions will be strategically put into place so that preservation into perpetuity can be assured. Archeological Conservancy and the Ohio non-profit Wilderness East are serving to temporarily hold co-ownership of the property with hefty mortgages until we can raise the purchase price in full. The Ross County Park District and the non-profit the Arc of Appalachia Preserve System will be the long-term co-owners of the property, both with extensive experience in natural area preservation. All of these organizations are making heroic sacrifices to save Spruce Hill.

Other Supportive Organizations: In addition to the organizations listed above, financial support has been received from : Ohio Archeological Council, the Archaeological Society of Ohio, Shawnee Indian Tribe of Oklahoma, SunWatch Indian Village, the Scioto Valley Bird and Nature Club, the Tri-Regional Indian Organization, the Appalachian Front Audubon Society, and the The Ohio Chapter and the Miami Group of the Sierra Club. Endorsements have been received from the Hopewell Culture National Historical Park, the International Crop Circle Research Association, and the Society for American Archeology. Media reporting on Spruce Hill has been covered by Native American media: the Native America Calling radio show, and  Indian Country newspaper (for news article click here), the local Chillicothe Gazette, NPR and the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
 

Access to the site for Gatherings

     Site managers are committed to welcoming small-scale gatherings who wish to visit the site for personal, spiritual, and scientific purposes, so long as the native earthworks and natural landscape are preserved, undisturbed and respected. For more information on visiting Spruce Hill, please call Larry Henry, Co-Director of the Arc of Appalachia Preserve System, at 9374-365-1600.

Blog for Field Reports--Please contribute your sightings and impressions!
 Katharine Parks, Spruce Hill neighbor and volunteer caretaker for the site, walks the boundaries and the trails on Spruce Hill on a frequent basis, reporting natural history observations, field conditions, and boundary issues. You can view her reports and share you own at  www.ohsprucehill.blogspot.com. For an overview of the botanical and zoological history of Spruce Hill, please click here.

****Though convenient and widely used, the word Hopewell is an unfortunate term for a number of reasons. One, the name Hopewell is of English descent rather than Native American, coming from the name of a Euro-American family who owned a famous and extensively excavated earthworks site. Hopewell is therefore not the name these peoples called themselves, as that knowledge has been lost to time. Secondly, we don't know if Hopewell peoples were one tribe, clan, or nation; or if they even all spoke the same language. Nevertheless, the words Hopewell Culture is currently understood to represent one important chapter of our country's first people, our indigenous ancestors. We hope that one day an alternative name will emerge for this chapter of history that is more appropriate and respectful to the lineage of these Native Americans.

Who to Contact with Questions:

For tour registration:
    reservations@highlandssanctuary.org 937-365-1935
For information on creative solutions, private tours, stock-giving and large donations:
    Larry Henry & Nancy Stranahan, Co-Directors
    Larry 937-365-1600 naturalist@highlandssanctuary.org
    Nancy 937-365-0101 director@highlandssanctuary.org
For more information on the Arc of Appalachia Preserve System
    www.highlandssanctuary.org

For more information on the Hopewell Culture National Historical Park
    www.nps.gov/hocu  740-774-1126

For more information on Ross County Park District
    Gary Mercamp, Park Director, 740-773-8794

For more information on Archaeological Conservancy

     www.americanarchaeology.org
     Paul Gardner, Midwest Director, 614-267-1100

Thank you for the precious gift of your time to read this message. We look forward to hearing from you.