Carnegie Center for Art & History

Carnegie Center Announces Grand Opening of a New Permanent Exhibit:

Ordinary People, Extraordinary Courage: Men and Women of the
Underground Railroad in the Indiana and Kentucky Borderland

The Carnegie Center for Art and History in New Albany, Indiana is pleased to announce the opening of a new permanent exhibit, Ordinary People, Extraordinary Courage: Men and Women of the Underground Railroad in the Indiana and Kentucky Borderland. This exhibit examines the nature of the antislavery community in Floyd County, Indiana, and places it in a regional and national context by describing the social, economic and cultural contours of the Falls region of the Ohio River Valley. Based on the book by Pamela Peters titled The Underground Railroad in Floyd County (North Carolina, 2001), the project contributes to the work by scholars such as Dr. Blaine Hudson at the University of Louisville, whose ongoing re-evaluation of the abolitionist movement has led to increased interest in the Underground Railroad.

(click here for larger image)

Ordinary People, Extraordinary Courage combines traditional museum exhibit displays with a multimedia, interactive DVD, which visitors will view in a small theatre within the exhibit. Text and graphic panels provide a visual introduction to the Underground Railroad through original documents relating to actual people whose stories and perspectives visitors follow throughout the exhibit.

Ordinary People, Extraordinary Courage offers a unique model for bringing the national story of the Underground Railroad into local focus, by using the DVD interactive learning experience as a springboard for a variety of educational outreach activities, including tours for school groups and the opportunity for those schools who cannot visit the Carnegie Center to borrow the DVD program for use in the classroom.

Click here for an audio sample of the DVD (2 minute QuickTime file)
Click here for an audio sample of the DVD (2 minute WMV file)

Actor Rob Love portrays Jacob Cummings, who
escaped from outside Chattanooga, Tennessee and whose
journey is followed throughout the six sections of the DVD program.

The National Park Service accepted Ordinary People, Extraordinary Courage in the "Network to Freedom Program" and the state of Indiana also recognized the educational and cultural tourism value of this program by naming the Carnegie Center as one of three "gateway" communities interpreting the Underground Railroad in seventeen counties in southeast Indiana.

Ordinary People, Extraordinary Courage explores three broad themes based on new research that are critical to understanding the nature of the Underground Railroad as it existed in southern Indiana. First, the exhibit draws attention away from the traditional eastern abolitionist nexus.

Second, it points to the significance of antislavery activism along the Mason-Dixon line among black residents willing to risk their own safety and white evangelicals appalled by the immorality of slavery. Third, the exhibit reveals the central role played by African Americans in the Underground Railroad in the Falls region and documents the ways in which they created a vibrant community able to aid runaways in the shadow of slavery and amid widespread white oppression.

Ongoing support has been generously provided by Solid Light, Inc. of Louisville, which is also the design firm in charge of the project, Jim and Phyllis Robinson of Lanesville, IN, Caesars Foundation of Floyd County, the New Albany/Floyd County Public Library, and the Department of the Interior, National Park Service. Previous major contributors include the Ogle Foundation, Dr. Curt and Pamela Peters, Cinergy Foundation and National City.

The Carnegie Center for Art & History
201 East Spring Street
New Albany, Indiana 47150

(812) 944-7336
(812) 981-3544 fax

info@carnegiecenter.org