At 2:40 on Saturday, February 22, 2020, The last Challenge Coin (#100) for the 2020 African American History Month Heritage Geocache Challenge was given out. Congratulations to all the Geocachers. The geocaches will remain in place for a few months for public education. Thank you for participating.
This Geocache is part of an annual Geocache Challenge put on by the Heritage Program at Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area as part of our outreach to the public, to get people to explore their forest and their history, and to share the unique heritage of the families from Between the Rivers.
This Geocache is part of the “2020 Land Between the Lakes Heritage Geocache Challenge: African American History of Lyon County”. There are 7 geocaches placed in Lyon County in Land Between the Lakes related to the African American Heritage of the area. If you locate each geocache, and collect a numbered aluminum tree tag from each cache, you can turn them in at the Golden Pond Visitor Center for one of 100 Challenge Coins created for this event.
The Geocache is a 6.5” x 8” watertight plastic box marked “Heritage Geocache” on the top. The geocache is placed in the woods at the former location of Henderson Chapel School.
The Henderson Chapel School Geocache
Henderson Chapel was one of three schools for African American children in Lyon County between the rivers; Henderson Chapel, Young’s Grove, and Oakland. Henderson Chapel is named for the Henderson family, a local African American family.
Gilliam Henderson was a young man in 1870 when he was working in the Iron Industry and living in Trigg County with his young family. By 1880, Gilliam had move his family to Lyon County and settled alongside a small local African American community (including the Bonners, Edwards, and Murrays), and began farming.
By 1910, the African American community had changed. The Cork, Rhodes, and Ingram families had moved in and lived next to the Henderson families. The son of Gilliam, William Henderson, had become the African American community’s public school teacher, a position he would hold till his death in 1940.