Field NotesOhio
Upper Falls in the Old Man's Cave gorge, Hocking Hills, with visitors on the rocks

An independent field guide · 365 places

The field guide to outdoor Ohio

Parks and forests, ancient mounds, caves, waterfalls and back roads, with the story behind each place and where to eat and fuel up nearby.
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  • 117parks & forests
  • 64ancient mounds
  • 34waterfalls
  • 40historic sites
  • 33road trips

Old Man's Cave, Hocking Hills · Photo: Rhododendrites, CC BY-SA 4.0

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State parks & forests117 places, with cabins, campsites and trails117 places Waterfalls34 falls, with trail notes34 falls Mounds & earthworks64 ancient sites, from Serpent Mound to Newark64 ancient sites Caves & caverns12 show caverns, recess caves and rock shelters12 caves Lake Erie beaches20 public beaches, Conneaut to Toledo20 beaches Historic sites40 places, from the frontier to the Civil War40 places Road trips33 drives, from the Lincoln Highway to the Morgan Heritage Trail33 drives Oddities19 giants, ghosts and folk-art stops19 roadside stops The Buckeye TrailA 1,444-mile loop, all 26 sections1,444 miles

New to the guide?

Six places to start

One from every corner of the state, each with its full story inside.

01Old Man's CaveHocking Hills · SoutheastA gorge of waterfalls and recess caves where a hermit is said to have lived, with the park's visitor center. 02Great Serpent MoundAdams County · SouthwestA gigantic earthen snake on a hilltop over Ohio Brush Creek, built by a people whose name is still argued over. 03Brandywine FallsCuyahoga Valley · NortheastThe tallest waterfall in Cuyahoga Valley National Park, reached by an easy boardwalk with an accessible upper overlook. 04Marblehead LighthouseMarblehead · Lake ErieThe oldest continuously operating lighthouse on the Great Lakes, lit since 1821, on nine acres of limestone shoreline. 05Zoar VillageTuscarawas County · EasternA well-preserved communal village founded by German separatists in 1817, on the Ohio & Erie Canal. 06Longaberger Basket BuildingNewark · CentralA seven-story office building shaped like a picnic basket, with handles that are heated in winter.

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Lake ErieWest Virginia36 places368 places813 places135 places523 places2321 places2124 places2416 places1613 places134 places418 places182 places217 places1710 places1014 places142 places27 places76 places613 places133 places34 places414 places143 places3Harrison Lake State Park2 places22 places22 places26 places64 places4

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Parks, forests & wildlife areas

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117 parks in 7 regions

Story Mound (Chillicothe)

Chillicothe · Ross County · Southern Ohio
An Adena mound with a wooden house buried in it
National Register of Historic PlacesOhio History Connection state memorial
Directions →Official source →

A neat Adena mound in a Chillicothe neighborhood, opened in 1897 to reveal the outline of a wooden house.

Size
19.5 feet high, 95 feet across at the base
Excavated
May 1897 by Clarence Loveberry for the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society
Found inside
The first documented circular Adena timber building, a young man's burial and three caches of artifacts, including six flint spear points
Setting
A Chillicothe neighborhood, about a quarter-mile from the Adena estate
Owner
Acquired by the State of Ohio in 1950 and managed by the Ohio History Connection

The story

Story Mound is a large rounded earthen mound on slightly less than an acre in a Chillicothe neighborhood, near Cherokee and Delano streets. It stands 19.5 feet high and 95 feet across at the base, and the Adena people built it sometime between 800 BCE and 100 CE. The Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society partly excavated it in May 1897. At the base, the archaeologists found traces of wooden posts set in a circle about 15 feet across: the outline of a circular timber building, the first documented example of the kind of structure the Adena used for ceremony and living.

Along the north wall of the building the builders had buried a young man, and they placed three groups of artifacts inside the circle, one of them a set of six flint spear points. The state acquired the mound in 1950. The Adena culture is named for the Adena estate, only a quarter-mile away.

Related sites

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
Published coordinates
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.

The House Under the Hill

Nobody who walks by Story Mound today would guess what is inside it. When the archaeologists dug down through the center in 1897, they found a house. Not a house of logs and mud, since that had rotted away centuries before, but a ring of dark post holes about 15 feet across, marking where a circular wooden building once stood. The builders had put a young man to rest along its north wall, laid out some spear points and jewelry, and then piled the earth over it all.

That ring of posts turned out to be the key to understanding how the Adena built: they raised a wooden house first, used it, and then covered it with a mound.

Behind the legend

The excavation is documented by the Ohio History Connection and a historical marker on the site, though one source spells the archaeologist's name Loveberry and another Loverberry. The skeleton was surrounded by jewelry, beads and projectile points. The mound was given to the state in 1950 and listed on the National Register in 1973.

The marker adds that the Adena were the ancestors of the Hopewell, whose earthworks are at the national park a few miles north.

If you go

Find Story Mound on Delano Avenue and look at the size of it from the sidewalk. Then walk or drive a quarter-mile to the Adena estate, where the culture got its name.

Visiting

Status
Open daylight hours
Managed by
Ohio History Connection
Hours
Open all daylight hours. Allow about 15 minutes.
Admission
Free
Please note
The mound sits in a residential street. Stay off it and respect the neighbors.
Official information →Directions

Parks nearby

Hopewell Culture National Historical Park
About 5 miles · The national park with the Hopewell earthworks just north of Chillicothe.
Open
Great Seal State Park
About 3 miles · The hills of Ohio's state seal.
Open
Scioto Trail State Park
About 9 miles · State park and forest with a CCC lake.
Open

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

Know a place that belongs here, or spotted something out of date? Email hello@fieldnotesohio.com.