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.
Try:
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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Explore Ohio

One map for every park, mound, historic site, beach, cave, waterfall and oddity in the app.

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

Story Mound (Cincinnati)

Sayler Park · Cincinnati · Southwest Ohio
A mound nobody has ever dug
National Register of Historic PlacesNever excavated

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.
Location confidence
Verified entrance or visitor center
Published coordinates

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 small burial mound in a Cincinnati neighborhood that has never been touched by a shovel.

Location
Along Gracely Drive in the Sayler Park neighborhood, near the Ohio River floodplain
Excavation
None, ever; the mound is undisturbed and in pristine condition
Attribution
Considered Adena because of bones found in the land around it
Area
About half an acre
Listed
National Register of Historic Places, 1975

The story

Story Mound stands along Gracely Drive in Sayler Park, on the far western edge of Cincinnati, close to the floodplain of the Ohio River. Unlike most Ohio mounds, it has never been excavated and has never been otherwise disturbed, so it remains in pristine condition. Archaeologists still attribute it to the Adena, because bones and other artifacts have turned up on the land right around it, and together with its location on the river floodplain, that suggests a larger group of Adena sites in the vicinity.

A complex like that, if it exists, would have great value as an archaeological site, which is one reason the mound was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.

Related sites

The Mound Nobody Has Dug

Ohio's mounds have a long history of being opened. Farmers dug into them, collectors dug into them, and scholars in white coats dug into them. Story Mound in Sayler Park is one of the few that no one has ever excavated, and that makes it a kind of time capsule: whatever the Adena put inside it is still there, exactly where they left it.

It sits in a quiet neighborhood on the edge of Cincinnati, with a big river a short walk away.

Behind the legend

The lack of excavation is documented by the National Register listing and it is the reason the mound is valued. It also means the attribution is an inference: the Adena label rests on artifacts and bones found around the mound, not on anything found inside it. Whether there was once a larger cluster of Adena sites here is unknown.

Do not confuse it with the Story Mound in Chillicothe, which was excavated in 1897.

If you go

Drive out to Sayler Park and look at the mound from Gracely Drive, and think about how rare it is to see one that has been left alone. Then walk toward the Ohio River.

Visiting

Status
Neighborhood landmark
Managed by
Check locally
Hours
Located along a residential street; view it from the road and confirm access.
Admission
Free (verify locally)
Please note
Please stay off the mound and respect neighboring property.
Directions

Parks nearby

East Fork State Park
About 33 miles · A huge lake park with a 46-mile backpack trail, east of Cincinnati.
Open
Hueston Woods State Park
About 33 miles · A lodge, cabins and lake near Oxford, with old-growth beech-maple forest.
Open

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