The Peru Gazette

Vivian and Don Papson, who collaborated in founding the new North Star Underground Railroad Museum in Ausable Chasm, were named winners of the 2012 Underground Railroad Free Press Prize.

The annoucement credits their work in uncovering the hidden stories of individuals and families who helped slaves escape up the Champlain Corridor to freedom in Canada before the Civil War.   They also uncovered stories of the former slaves who stayed and made their lives in the North Country.

Here is the award announcement:

After years investigating Underground Railroad lore in New York state’s Adirondacks, the Papsons, husband and wife, founded the North Country Underground Railroad Historical Association in 2005. The couple have since illuminated the Champlain Line of the Underground Railroad now reseen as a major fugitive passageway to Canada. The couple began their Underground Railroad work by researching 400 years of Afri- can American history of the Champlain Valley, then writing dramatic readings based on their discoveries, and delivering presentations to conferences, schools and historical societies.

The Champlain Line includes the Hudson River, Champlain Canal and Lake Champlain. Fugitives reaching there took water transport on their northward journeys or stagecoach or rail lines from New York City and New England to the region. Lake Champlain, straddling the United States and Canada, was the gateway to freedom. It was the Papsons who revealed much of the area’s Underground Railroad history to 2008 Free Press Prize winner Tom Calarco for his The Underground Railroad in the Adirondack Region (McFarland, 2011).

To further the Adirondacks’ Underground Railroad story, the Papsons led the formation of the North Star Underground Rail- road Museum which opened in 2011 in the town of Chesterfield Heritage Center near Ausable Chasm. The Museum researches, preserves, interprets and promotes Underground Railroad his- tory of northeastern New York’s Waterways to Freedom area, and celebrates its relevance and significance to our own time.

The North Star Underground Railroad Museum has become a magnet for descendants of Underground Railroad freedom seekers and abolitionists, and the general public. In its first year, the museum had over 4,000 visitors from 23 nations, a seldom- matched performance for museums of similar size.

Understanding that resonating stories sustain an Underground Railroad museum, Vivian and Donald Papson schooled them- selves in mission formulation, board development, fundraising, succession planning, grant writing, staff training and interpre- tive use of collections to incorporate and launch the museum, and gathered advice of every museum in their region to learn what works and what doesn’t for small rural organizations.

Donald Papson is soon stepping down as chair of the museum board to work on two Underground Railroad books which he is coauthoring with Tom Calarco.