Chillicothe has a rich history when it comes to the Underground Railroad. Men and women would come to places like Chillicothe, Greenfield, or South Salem and Frankfort when slave catchers were out looking for them because they knew that places like these were safe havens for runaway slaves.

The Underground Railroad was actually a system of people who helped move fugitive slaves from plantations of enslavement in the south to freedom in the north, preferrably Canada.

The original name was Underground Road because railroads had not been used in the US at that time.

The David Nickens Heritage Center on West Fourth Street in Chillicothe has an exhibit of the Underground Railroad on display.