New Straitsville's Annual Moonshine Festival and MORE

     I have lived in Ohio my entire life and this was my first trip to New Straitsville (about one hour from my home town Lancaster Ohio) and the MOONSHINE FESTIVAL MAY 21-25TH

In the 1930's. New Straitsville was known from New York to California and even places over seas as "The Wet Capitol of Ohio." Today there is no reason to be thirsty in New Straitsville

Sometimes when you visit a new place you learn a little history and get to see some unexpected scenery. Robinson’s Cave, Coal, Mine Fires, Founding of U.M.W.A. Union, and an old time Soda Fountain

The cave is actually a sandstone outcropping common in the unglaciated region of Ohio. It is named after Seth Robinson the man who owned this property and operated a mine in the 1880’s. The cave was used as a secret meeting place for coal miners in the 1880’s. In 1884 Chris Evans originally from England led the regions miners in the historic hocking valley coal strike. During the strike it is believed that angry miners met at the cave before soaking loaded coal cars with kerosene setting them afire and pushing them into the mines

The event actually turned into a tourist attraction..

This action lit the worlds largest underground mine fire which burned thousands of acres..In 1889 Evans was elected executive secretary of the American Federation of Labor (A.F.of L.)

 NOT A DISGRUNTLED COAL MINER,BUT SHE IS THIRSTY..

So we end the trip to New Straitsville with a stop at the “soda fountain” for some cool lemonade and a couple B.L.T’s.

This is the trail we didn’t take

Sometimes one needs to stay off the “Road Less Traveled”

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