‘A great opportunity’
The 10th annual Mason Dixon hike Sunday starts at 10:30 a.m. from the parking lot beside the Red Barn at Mason-Dixon Historical Park, Buckeye Road, near Core, W.Va.
This hike is more than a chance to be outdoors, it is an opportunity to experience some of the history of the survey line that helped establish a nation. The park straddles what is now the state line between West Virginia and Pennsylvania that started in Maryland in 1763 when surveyors Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon were hired to settle border disputes between colonies, including Pennsylvania and Virginia. Hikers will be able to walk with historian Doug Wood of Nitro, W.Va., who will offer them an interactive journey into the past.
Wood, known for his re-enactment of Cherokee leader Ostenaco (1703-1780), will show what these frontier times were like when seen through the eyes of indigenous people who made treaties with advancing Europeans and were drawn into the conflict that history remembers as the French and Indian War. An interactive activity also will be held to mark the return of prisoners from this war.
Fellow historical re-enactors Dianne Anestis of Nitro and Ed Roby of Morgantown, W.Va., will join Wood in his presentation.
Amature astronomer and Mason Dixon Line lover Pete Zapadka of Morgantown will guide the walk along the banks of Dunkard Creek to the place where the survey team was forced to end its work and made a last encampment before returning to Maryland.
On Oct. 8, 1767, Charles Mason noted in his journal:
“At 232 miles 43 chains crossed Dunchard’s Creek a second time. At 232 miles 74 chains crossed Ditto a third time. This day the Chief of the Indians which joined us on the 16th of July informed us that the above mentioned War Path was the extent of his commission from the Chiefs of the Six Nations that he should go with us, with the Line; and that he would not proceed one step farther Westward.”
It would be another 15 years before the line was resurveyed by Cephas H. Sinclair and extended 23 miles to establish the western corner of Pennsylvania.
“This is a great opportunity for history buffs to learn about Mason and Dixon, their contemporaries and the history of the line, which has nothing to do with the Civil War or slavery, as so often believed today. After all, the line was drawn 100 years before the war,” Zapadka said.
The hike along the creek is less than a mile and hikers can choose to return to the Red Barn by climbing the trail to Brown’s Hill to visit the site where Mason Dixon stacked stones around a white oak post to mark the end of their part of the line.
The marker that is now on the hill is a replacement stone, set in 1883.
For directions and more information about Mason-Dixon Historical Park, call 304-292-3946.
To learn more about the western end of the Mason-Dixon Line, visit exploretheline.com.