Field Notes Ohio

Ohio's parks, forests and wildlife areas with camping, the ancient mounds beside them, and the Buckeye Trail that links them. Stories, trails, wildlife, and where to eat and fuel up nearby. Book campsites on ReserveOhio.
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The Buckeye TrailA 1,444-mile blue-blazed loop around Ohio, with all 26 sections.
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Mounds & Earthworks43 ancient sites, including the Great Serpent Mound and the Newark Earthworks.
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Historic Sites39 places, from Fort Steuben and Zoar to Camp Chase and the Rankin House, from the frontier to the Civil War.
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Road Trips33 drives, from the Lincoln Highway to the Morgan Heritage Trail.
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Lake Erie Beaches20 public beaches from Conneaut to Toledo and the islands, with a map.
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Oddities & Roadside Attractions19 giants, ghosts and folk-art stops, plus a Mothman just over the line.
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Caves & Caverns12 show caverns, recess caves and rock shelters, with a map.
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Waterfalls34 falls from the Cuyahoga Valley to the Hocking Hills, with trail notes and a map.
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Lake ErieWest Virginia27 places277 places77 places73 places35 places519 places1913 places1319 places1916 places168 places810 places1010 places109 places98 places820 places204 places43 places3Barkcamp State Park4 places47 places77 places76 places69 places917 places173 places3Harrison Lake State Park2 places2Forked Run State Park3 places32 places26 places610 places103 places32 places2

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117 parks in 7 regions

Great Council State Park (Old Chillicothe)

Oldtown · Greene County · Southwest Ohio
The site of a Shawnee capital, now a state park built with the Shawnee nations
Ohio's 76th state parkBuilt with three Shawnee nations

Visiting information you can trust

Content last reviewed
September 2026 — this is when Field Notes Ohio's content was last checked, not a live status.
Primary official source
Official page
Location confidence
Verified entrance or visitor center
Great Council State Park, 1587 US-68, Xenia
Check current conditions
Official conditions or closures
Reservations or tickets
Tickets or admission info

Prices, hours, closures, campsite availability and trail conditions shown elsewhere on this page are not live — always confirm with the official source before you go.

A new state park on the site of the Shawnee town of Old Chillicothe, with an interpretive center shaped like a council house.

Town
Old Chillicothe (Chalahgawtha), a Shawnee town led by Chief Blackfish, settled from 1774; more than 1,000 people lived here about 1777 to 1780
Prisoners
Daniel Boone was captured in February 1778 and lived here as part of Blackfish's family until June; Simon Kenton was made to run the gauntlet
Attack
General Benjamin Logan attacked the town in 1779
Park
Opened June 7, 2024 on about 14.7 acres, Ohio's 76th state park
Center
A 12,000-square-foot interpretive center modeled on a Shawnee council house, with a living stream, theater and three floors of exhibits
Partners
The Shawnee Tribe, the Eastern Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma and the Absentee Shawnee Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma

The story

Old Chillicothe was a Shawnee town on the Little Miami River founded in the 1770s under the war chief Blackfish. The name means 'capital city,' the town where the chief of the Chalahgawtha division lived, and from 1777 to 1780 it was the largest grouping of Shawnee anywhere in Ohio, home to more than 400 families. The people farmed corn, beans, squash and melons, hunted and used the river, and the town was a base for raids into Kentucky against American settlers who were moving onto Shawnee hunting ground.

Two frontiersmen lived through captivity here. Blackfish captured Daniel Boone in February 1778 and adopted him into his family, and Boone stayed several months before he escaped in June. Simon Kenton was held and made to run the gauntlet more than once. In 1779 General Benjamin Logan attacked the town during the Revolution. Ohio's Shawnee were later forced out of the state, and the nation was removed west in the 1830s. The park opened in 2024 after the state of Ohio, the Ohio History Connection and the three federally recognized Shawnee tribes worked together, and its 12,000-square-foot center tells the Shawnee's story in their own homeland and today. A statue of Tecumseh stands out front, although the earlier belief that Tecumseh was born here is now thought mistaken.

The Motel That Became a Museum of a Shawnee Capital

The council house of Old Chillicothe is believed to have stood on the ridge behind a small roadside motel on US 68. In 2021 the state bought the motel, and a few years later the site opened as Ohio's newest state park, with a building shaped like the council houses the Shawnee used to gather in.

The governor who launched it grew up nearby and passed the site countless times without knowing what had been there.

Behind the legend

The 2021 purchase of the 0.7-acre motel site for $260,000, the 2024 opening, the partnership with the three Shawnee tribes, the 1,000 residents and the Boone and Kenton accounts are from Wikipedia, ODNR, the Shawnee Tribe and the Dayton Daily News. That Governor DeWine grew up in Yellow Springs is in the Dayton Daily News. The council house's exact site is 'believed' rather than proved. The reasoning that Tecumseh was born here has been questioned, as Wikipedia notes.

If you go

Take the free tour of the interpretive center, walk the grounds and combine it with Glen Helen and Yellow Springs, both a few miles south.

Visiting

Status
Open; confirm hours
Managed by
Ohio Department of Natural Resources
Hours
See the ODNR page for current hours. A free one-hour guided tour of the interpretive center starts at the panther statue in the lobby.
Admission
Tours are free; see ODNR for park fees.
Phone
See ODNR
Please note
Confirm the tour schedule before you go.
Address
US 68, Oldtown, Xenia Township, OH 45385
Official information →DirectionsFind trails nearby on AllTrails →

Hours and prices change. Confirm with the site before you go.

Parks nearby

John Bryan State Park
About 10 miles · A gorge park with a campground near Yellow Springs.
Open
Caesar Creek State Park
About 15 miles · A lake park with lakeshore trail.
Open

Buckeye Trail

Caesar Creek Section
55 miles · on or near the Buckeye Trail
Open

Details last checked 2026-09-22. Confirm hours and prices before you go.