SPARTA, Ill. (AP) - The hackberry tree in front of James and Phyllis Hayes’ house has seen it all.
The tree, whose girth is larger than most any adult arm span, has ushered in six generations of the Hayes family to the Sparta estate. It’s seen birthday parties, Christmas mornings and funerals.
The tree has also kept secrets - most notably the quiet arrival of slaves stopping on their way to freedom as part of the Underground Railroad.
James is the fifth generation of his family to live at the home. He and his wife bought it from his aunt and uncle, Gladys and Russell Hayes, and moved into the house in September 1978.
Phyllis wasn’t happy. They had just remodeled an old home in town and she knew what they were up against by moving into such an old home - which, up until three years ago, did not have running water.
“It was barbaric,” Phyllis remembers.
But James wanted to be in the country to tend to his horses, and wanted to help continue a family legacy, so they moved.
As they slowly moved through the house, cleaning and modernizing it, James and Phyllis came across a box in their attic. It was filled with hundreds of letters dating back to before the Hayes family settled in Southern Illinois. It was not until they read through the letters and started to ask questions that they found out about the family’s incredible history.
James’ great-great-great-great-grandfather, William Hayes, was a known abolitionist, James said, and assisted slaves escaping north to freedom by opening his home as a stop on the Underground Railroad, a network of safe-havens that lead to free states and to Canada.
“It was something the family just didn’t talk about,” James said.
Phyllis had a theory.
“They seemed to be kind of, maybe, ashamed,” she said of Russell and Gladys.
James said he was able to get some answers from them about the history.
“They were open about it more so than past generations,” he said.
James said the black community seemed to have more of an idea than they did of the significance of their house to local history.
“The older black families … were familiar with the story more than my family was,” he said.
The history of the Hayes House, as it has come to be known, was chronicled in Carol Pirtle’s 2000 book “Escape Betwixt Two Suns.” The book details the 1843 lawsuit filed by William Hayes’ neighbor, Andrew Borders, which accuses Hayes of harboring fugitive slave Susan “Sukey” Richardson and her children.
They have never been completely sure where the hiding places in the home were, but as James and Phyllis renovated the house and talked with family, they started to get hunches. Phyllis pointed to space under what used to be an enclosed staircase and said they suspect this was used to hide runaways.
Gladys said she has always been impressed with the longevity of the family estate, but said its history with the Underground Railroad is on her mind often.
“I just think how scared, how frightened those people must have been,” she said. She feels like the house is now bigger than her or her husband.
“I just feel like I’m a caretaker,” Phyllis said.
Looking ahead to the future of the home, neither James nor Phyllis are sure what will happen after they are gone. They do not suspect any of their children will take on the house and surrounding 16 acres, but do hope someone will come in who appreciates the history.
“I wish it’d be a family member,” Phyllis said.
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Source: The (Carbondale) Southern Illinoisan, https://bit.ly/2lHhd3T
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Information from: Southern Illinoisan, https://www.southernillinoisan.com
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