Docent Howard McClain talks about the history of Rankin House.
Kentucky Gateway Museum Center held a seminar on the history of Reverend John Rankin and the newly restored Rankin House on Saturday, July 15.
Docent of the Rankin House, Howard McClain addressed what was a well tended assembly for a rainy day in the second floor research library of KYGMC on Saturday morning.
McClain grew up in Georgetown and Sardinia and graduated from Morehead University and double majored in history and communication. He said he has always had a unique connection to history which led to his passion for the Rankin House.
Many people are familiar with the history of the Rankin House and of Rev. John Rankin who was an American Presbyterian minister, educator and abolitionist who moved to Ripley, Ohio in 1822 and became one of Ohio’s first and most active ‘conductors’ on the underground railroad (referenced on www.nps.gov).
“Growing up in Georgetown, which is the former home of General Ulysses S. Grant, history was in my backyard—literally. His home was half a block, maybe a block away from my house and as a little boy I was peeking into windows constantly, even though it was closed many years. Eventually they started letting me in for free, thankfully, and I had my first tour of the Rankin House 52 years ago,” McClain said.
Growing up with so much history around him made McClain realize history was everywhere, not just his own back yard but in everyone else’s as well, he said.
“I encourage everyone to find your own history, find where you came from, find where your parents came from,” he said.
McClain encourages parents to write down events for their children, their family history and to make sure it is passed down.
“My philosophy of history is simply, the most important word in history is the s-t-o-r-y, the story and when you paint that story for people paint it with every color because history is not meant to be pretty it is meant to be as factual, honest and true as we can make it. That is what I try to do at the Rankin House,” he said.
Before getting to Ripley which was his original destination Rankin spent four years living and ministering in Carlisle, KY, due to financial circumstances which stranded him on his way to Ohio, McClain said. However, McClain believes Rankin was always meant to go to Ripley and circumstances eventually brought him there.
According to McClain there were actually three houses Rankin lived in in Ripley, the first was a log cabin, the second was actually built as a apartment complex with three dwellings. The third is the well known historical Rankin House.
He showed pictures of the apartment complex Rankin built where he and his family lived in one apartment and rented the other two out for $50 each for the whole year.
Rankin was not a rich man but was one devoted to his ministry and preaching against slavery according to McClain.
“In 1822 he came across the Ohio River with a wife and four children to Ripley to be the minister in the first church building specifically built as a church. A wife and four children and he takes a job that only pays $350 a year,” he said.
McClain said Rankin and his siblings had been taught from an early age that slavery was wrong.
“Rankin had wanted to be a minister his whole life, since he was about 10 years of age. He told his father that when he became a minister he would stand in the pulpit and if those men in front of him owned slaves he was going to tell them that they were sinning against God, that they needed to repent of those sins and that they needed to free those slave. Otherwise they were setting themselves up for eternal damnation, that was the message of a 10 year old boy that he carried with him for the next 83 years,” he said.
When Rankin became a minister he was rejected and run out of Tennessee with threats of being lynched, McClain explained Rankin chose to go to Ripley because it was already well known that slaves went there and disappeared.
“The people of Ripley had been helping slaves for almost 20 years by hiding them in their homes and businesses away from the bounty hunters who were pursuing them,” he said.
McClain also spoke of how when Rankin found out through a letter from his brother that he was a successful man in Virginia who owned slaves he wrote 25 letters outlining why it was wrong. Rankin had an argument against every single reason people gave in favor of slavery.
Before the letters were sent McClain said through happenstance and the right connections, the letters were published by multiple publishers and papers and were the first anti-slavery writings to appear.
Rankin’s brother eventually received the letters and moved to Ohio with his slaves where he set them free, according to McClain.
Copies of Rankins published works are available for purchase still at the Rankin House, McClain said and tours are $8 for adults and $5 for students K-12. Rankin House address is 6152 Rankin Hill Road in Ripley, Ohio.
