The closing of a Walgreens on Syracuse’s near east side this week has people wondering about the corner lot’s future. Most might not remember that the site’s past played a key role in the fight against slavery.
Chances are those who pass this corner of East Genesee and Pine have no idea of its place in Syracuse history. How would they really? The simple brick building doesn’t tell the story of the lives saved. And a small metal sign marking the location as a key stop on the underground railroad can be easy to overlook.
Robert Searing is curator of History at the Onondaga Historical Association. He says the marker is only a recent tribute.
“We're lucky that there's that sign there now," Searing said. "Because what is really awful is that there was nothing there. So until they put that sign up in the early 2000s, people had no idea. As a historian, that's the worst possible thing.”
Also forgotten might be Reverend Jermain Loguen, whom Searing considers a personal hero. He escaped slavery in Tennessee, became a minister, and settled in Syracuse in 1841 with his wife Caroline.
“By 1846 1847, he has purchased several properties around the city including what will be the homestead for the Loguen family, which is a building on a lot on the corner of Pine and Genesee Street.”
Searing says within a few years, this location became widely known as the center of the Underground Railroad in Syracuse, with Loguen serving as station master. In fact, he says there was nothing underground about it.
“He will often have donation drives have advertised in the local Syracuse newspapers advertised and other newspapers around New York State collecting and soliciting gifts, money, food clothing for refugees in his house, so it is a well-known spot.”
Loguen and his wife helped about 1,500 freedom seekers. But Searing says that contribution is largely forgotten today. There is no photographic evidence of their house.
“I've got what may be one of the most frustrating pictures in the history of my career as a curator here," Searing said. "I think this picture is taken from the front yard of Jermain and Caroline Loguen's residence.”
The photo from the 1950s shows homes across the street. If only the photographer had turned around. But Searing says he’s pieced together plenty of other proof that Loguen and his family lived there.
“This is kind of cool over here. This is an 1875 map. So this is three years after Loguen. What I'll point out to you is your block 224 which is where the property was is right here," Searing says pointing at the map. "There's a house on the corner that you can actually see right here. So see there's Genesee, there's Pine. See that structure? That's a house on that block. That's Loguen's house."
Searing also found Loguen and his location in an 1853 city directory, and his will signing over the property to his son.
But Searing says what made it so well-known about 170 years ago barely registered a century later during the Near East Side Urban Renewal project of the 1960s. The redevelopment effort aimed at addressing what was seen as urban decay forced people out, demolished properties, and changed streets, much like the 15th ward near I-81. Searing estimates Loguen’s home was among those that were razed in the early 1970s.
“What's fascinating and really disheartening and sort of tragic in this, is it, I can't find really any uproar, any mention of that home and what it meant," Searing said. "So you know, is it one of these things where the people that had been connected to the man and to his wife and to the family are gone, that historical memory is gone.”
Searing says this was a time when Syracuse was once again a hotbed of activity.
“You have major civil rights activism in the city, in and around those neighborhoods protesting urban renewal, protesting the construction of Interstate 81.”
With the closing of the drug store, the future of the site is unclear. Current and proposed zoning rules allow for flexibility, within reason, for commercial uses within this largely residential area. Regardless, Searing sees his role to educate and raise awareness in hopes of encouraging more informed decisions.
“I’ve found in my career is that once you tell people the story, you let them know the power of narrative, it sometimes changes decisions, right? It makes people think, in a different way, about something that may have been a sort of a cold calculus business decision," Searing said. "And they realized that there's a there's an opportunity to do something more profound, more impactful.”
