History
From 13,000 BC to 400 AD the Early Native American Indians (including Hopewell Indians) lived in the area and visited the gorge. Beginning in the early 19th century, Anglo-European settlers used it as a transportation route through the hilly east-central Ohio landscape.
Legend of the Black Hand
One origin legend describes a contest set up between two suitors. The loser amputated his own hand in shame and threw it off one of the gorge's cliffs (possibly above the current location of the railroad tunnel), creating a hand-shaped mark on the rock.
For complete review of the Blackhand Gorge, including the legend of the Black Hand, see Blackhand Gorge: A Journey Through Time by Aaron Keirns. It was first published in 1995 by Little River Publishing.
Read more about this topic: Blackhand Gorge State Nature Preserve
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“In front of these sinister facts, the first lesson of history is the good of evil. Good is a good doctor, but Bad is sometimes a better.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“America is the only nation in history which miraculously has gone directly from barbarism to degeneration without the usual interval of civilization.”
—Georges Clemenceau (1841–1929)
“If you look at history you’ll find that no state has been so plagued by its rulers as when power has fallen into the hands of some dabbler in philosophy or literary addict.”
—Desiderius Erasmus (c. 1466–1536)