Register 54 Seats Remaining

The Great Hopewell Road: Ohio's Ancient Superhighway

with Ohio History Connection

Ohio History Connection Archaeologist Dr. Brad Lepper will talk about the Great Hopewell Road, a set of parallel earthen walls built by the Hopewell culture. Registration required.

The Great Hopewell Road was a set of parallel earthen walls built by the Hopewell culture, which lived in Ohio between about 1 and 400 CE. This sacred avenue may have connected the monumental Newark Earthworks with the concentration of similar earthworks along the Scioto River near Chillicothe. Therefore, the road may have been a route of pilgrimage connecting the two grandest ceremonial centers of the Hopewell world. Eight of these earthworks, including the Newark Earthworks, the Fort Ancient Earthworks, and the five earthworks at Hopewell Culture National Historical Park are now a UNESCO World Heritage site. 

Brad Lepper is the Senior Archaeologist - Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks for the Ohio History Connection. In addition, he has occasionally been a Visiting Professor of Sociology and Anthropology at Denison University. His primary areas of interest include North America’s Ice Age peoples, Ohio’s magnificent mounds and earthworks, and the history of Archaeology. Dr. Lepper has written extensively on these subjects for both technical journals and magazines intended for a general audience. He is the author of the book, Ohio Archaeology: An illustrated Chronicle of Ohio's Ancient American Indian Cultures, published in 2005 by Orange Frazer Press. He also writes a monthly column on archaeology for the Columbus Dispatch. Dr. Lepper earned his BA degree from the University of New Mexico and his MA and PhD degrees from The Ohio State University. Noteworthy research includes excavation of the Burning Tree mastodon and discovery of the Great Hopewell Road, featured in a documentary that was first broadcast on PBS in 1998. Dr. Lepper was born and raised in northeastern Ohio, and now lives in Newark, in the vicinity of the extensive ancient earthworks of that region, with his wife Karen, two children, one dog, and four cats.

The Ohio History Connection, formerly the Ohio Historical Society, is a statewide history organization with the mission to spark discovery of Ohio’s stories. As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization chartered in 1885, the Ohio History Connection carries out history services for Ohio and its citizens focused on preserving and sharing the state’s history.

Upcoming events