Study indicates $20M cost to restore site of Mayhew Cabin and John Brown's Cave
Historians differ about whether the Allen Mayhew Cabin, built in 1852, was a stop on the Underground Railroad. But the cabin, built from cottonwood, is one of the oldest structures in Nebraska, predating statehood. (Paul Hammel/Nebraska Examiner)
LINCOLN — An assessment of restoring the historic Mayhew Cabin and John Brown's Cave site in Nebraska City estimates it would cost in excess of $20 million to make it a viable attraction again.
Most of the cost, the report indicated, would be demolishing several of the seven existing structures on the site, which have been damaged by flooding and neglect.
Building a new museum to interpret the cabin, a site used by escaping slaves on the Underground Railroad during the Civil War, would cost $3 million alone, according to the assessment by the architectural firm, Clark & Enerson.
Cathleen Van Winkle, the president of the foundation that owns the Mayhew Cabin complex, said she was not surprised by the expensive repair estimate, given the extensive damage caused by flooding in 2019 and 2013.
Van Winkle, in an email on Friday, said that the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, which paid for the assessment, has told the Foundation that there is 'little likelihood' that the Nebraska Legislature will appropriate money to rebuild the museum due to state budget shortfalls.
Still, she said, she's hopeful something might be done during the current legislative session.
'If funding fails, the Foundation will have no choice but to go back to square one to begin looking for other partners and alternative plans to save the cabin and its rich history,' Van Winkle said.
Another member of the Foundation board, Robert Nelson, an Underground Railroad historian and former columnist with the Omaha World-Herald, said he's hopeful the cabin can be saved and become part of a historic byway being developed along the 'Lane Trail.' That is a Civil War-era pathway from Iowa to Kansas used by escaping slaves as well as Abolitionists — including John Brown — seeking to join the fight against pro-slavery forces in Kansas.
'We'll do anything to save the (Mayhew) cabin,' Nelson said in an interview. 'We'd love it to be as close as possible to this trail.'
The Mayhew Cabin, which is listed on the National Park Service Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, has been closed since the 2019 flooding. The flooding prompted the Mayhew Foundation to sue unsuccessfully the City of Nebraska City, claiming it was negligent for allowing runoff from the nearby ravine to damage the site and its structures.
Other calamities have damaged the site, including a 2013 flood, a large tree that fell atop a church on the property, and a series of sewage backups at a museum structure, which has a sinking foundation. The museum also has seen two break-ins in recent years.
If funding fails, the Foundation will have no choice but to go back to square one to begin looking for other partners and alternative plans to save the cabin and its rich history.
– Cathleen Van Winkle, president of the foundation that owns the Mayhew Cabin complex
The recent study indicated that the underground tunnel — a 'cave' that a Mayhew family member has said was used to store potatoes, not by escaping slaves — was deemed unstable and in need of replacement.
Replacement was also recommended for the museum, which the engineers estimated would cost $100,000 to demolish and $3 million for a new museum.
Also recommended to be demolished and replaced were a railroad depot, a church and a picnic shelter on the property, which are all owned by the Foundation.
Due to a lack of funds, the Foundation has been unable to make any repairs since the site was closed in 2019. In 2023, the Foundation signed a letter of intent to donate the site to the Game and Parks Commission, which led to the site assessment.
Some fans of the Mayhew Cabin site have other ideas. That includes a Peru State professor, Sara Crook, who does historical portrayals of the older sister of John Kagi, an abolitionist who brought escaped slaves to the cabin and was a friend of John Brown.
Crook, who is on the state Hall of Fame Commission, said that in her opinion, only the Mayhew Cabin needs to be saved and preserved, which would reduce the cost of restoring the site substantially.
In an email to the Examiner, Jim Swenson, the assistant director of the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, said that after meeting with the Mayhew Foundation board this week 'there may be revisions in scope to reduce the cost.'
Crook also said that the Nebraska State Historical Society would be a more appropriate agency to lead the restoration, rather than the Game and Parks Commission.
Whether the cabin should remain where it is, in a flood-prone location, or moved elsewhere in Nebraska City or Lincoln or another community, is another question.
The site assessment recommended that the cabin — which was moved from its original site due to the widening of an adjacent highway — be relocated onto a more stable foundation.
John Brown's Cave has served as a tourist attraction since the 1930s. But over the years, the focus of the site has shifted from the cave and any connection to the famed abolitionist John Brown, to the role of the Mayhew family and of one of its relatives, John Kagi.
Kagi, who lived several months at the Mayhew Cabin, helped slaves escape northward from nearby slave states, like Missouri, to reach freedom. He was second in command to Brown during the failed raid on Harper's Ferry, West Virginia, on Oct. 17, 1859. Kagi was killed during the raid.
Four years earlier, Kagi had lived with his sister Barbara Mayhew and her husband, Allen, at a Mayhew Cabin.
A 2002 article for the Nebraska State Historical Society's magazine stated that Kagi had once brought 14 escaped slaves to the Nebraska City cabin, who, after eating breakfast, continued on foot northward.
A letter from Edward Mayhew, Barbara and Allen's son, refuted earlier newspaper accounts that Brown himself had guided escaped slaves to freedom through a tunnel underneath the Mayhew cabin. The son said the cave was dug for storing potatoes, that slaves never used it and that John Brown never visited it.
The cabin was moved to its current location in 1937 to accommodate the construction of Highway 2, which has since been relocated to the south edge of Nebraska City. The tunnel beneath the cabin was dug in hopes of attracting tourists, according to a 2014 article evaluating sites on the Underground Railroad.
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