Fairmount Mound

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Sketch of Fairmount Mound and Church from 1875 Atlas of Licking County

Fairmount Mound is sited just north of the National Road (US-40) at Fairmount Church on a road of the same name. The large, burial mound is attributed to the Hopewell cultural period and, like other Native-American mounds, it has become incorporated into the modern landscape as a sacred space. [1] Fairmount Presbyterian Church sits very close to the mound, and the field nearby became a burial site for American settlers in the area in the mid-nineteenth century. The church was organized in 1834 by Rev. Jonathan Cable and the building erected in 1835. [2] This reuse of the sacred space has helped preserve this fifteen-foot high and eighty-foot wide, prehistoric structure. [3] The fortunate preservation of Fairmount Mound is the exception for the once numerous embankments and mounds in the surrounding environs, which have been largely destroyed through human activity. [4]



Fairmount Mound and cemetery as they appeared in a photograph from 1904

J.G.


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References

  1. Pacheco, P. "The Legacy of the Licking River Basin Moundbuilders," Vanishing Heritage, (1992), 23-25
  2. Hill, N. History of Licking County, Ohio, (1881), 496
  3. Woodward and McDonald, Indian Mounds of the Middle Ohio Valley, (2002), 185-186
  4. Hill, N. History of Licking County, Ohio, (1881), 420