Hestia Homeschool for Young Wild Women

Dear Educator,

Thank you so much for participating in Cincinnati Museum Center’s new integrated education program, "History of the Ohio River." Your students will participate in activities centered on the theme, "Humans affect the river, and the river affects humans." These activities will cover topics, such as

-How the Ohio River helped determine the location of Cincinnati

-The importance of river trade to the Ohio River Valley

-The difficulty of flatboat travel and its importance to the settlement of the area

-The impact that 19th century industry had on the water quality of the Ohio River

-The effect that river trade and the shipping industry had on 19th century Cincinnati

-How water-borne diseases spread through Cincinnati in the 19th century

-How locks and dams changed the Ohio River

-Pollution, and its effects on the river’s ecology

-Bridging the Ohio River

Enclosed in this packet, you will find activities designed to prepare your students for their visit. While you will not need to do all of these activities in class, please try to do activity number four and as many others as possible. You will also find a glossary of terms and a list of concepts that your students should be familiar with before their visit.

Pre-Visit Activities

1. Ask your students to talk to their parents, grandparents or caregivers about their memories of the Ohio River. Have them ask what effect the river had on their lives when they were growing up and what memories they have of the river. Although the Ohio River is the focus of this program, not every family may have always lived in this area, so students may gather oral histories about any kind of natural landmark, i.e. oceans, rivers, mountains, etc…Have students take notes while their family members are relaying their stories.

After the students have interviewed a family member, have them write a paper where they compare and contrast their memories and experiences with the river to that of their family’s.

2. Have students create a timeline of their life, recording at least one important event for each year.

3. Have the class divide into groups and research Cincinnati and the Ohio River in three time periods, 1800-1820, 1860-1880 and 1900-1920. Then have a discussion about the pros and cons of each time period for Cincinnatians and the Ohio River, in terms of population, industry, culture, and/or transportation.

4. In one of the activities, your students will encounter a variety of first-person characters from the year 1859, including a pork merchant, an apothecary, a steamboat captain or clerk, an African-American daguerreotypist, and a commission merchant. These people will be available to talk about the impact that 19th century Cincinnati industry and culture had on the Ohio River and how the river impacted early Cincinnati. Please have your students write questions to ask of these people, based on their knowledge of 19th century Cincinnati.

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• #3 Comment from my78novata 
  4/24/05 9:18 AM | Permalink

  yeah just hope its not snowing like it isnow. WHowould have thunk we would ahve white covering on april 24tH!!!!!!!!!!!
• #2 Comment from theresarrt7 
  4/24/05 3:04 AM | Permalink

  Thanks for the great questions you left at my journal.  Those will really get me to thinkin' on the river! http://journals.aol.com/theresarrt7/TheresaWilliams-author/
  
• #1 Comment from oceanmrc 
  4/23/05 10:07 PM | Permalink

  Check out:
  http://journals.aol.com/theresarrt7/TheresaWilliams-author/entries/742
  http://journals.aol.com/theresarrt7/TheresaWilliams-author/entries/687
  and some other entries in between