The Underground Railroad was neither underground nor a railroad, but a loosely connected system of safe havens where people escaping slavery were sheltered, fed, clothed, nursed, concealed, disguised, and instructed on their journey to freedom. Because those involved faced retribution under civil law and from slave-catchers, much of this work was kept secret. Thousands of runaway slaves passed through Ohio or settled there permanently, shaping the state's history. In Seneca County, the Omar Inn, which once stood about 0.2 miles south of this site on the east side of present-day State Route 4, served as an Underground Railroad station, with runaway slaves hidden in its livery stable until they could be safely transported to Seven Mile House just south of Sandusky. Thomas Bennitt established the Omar Inn around 1830, and it was later managed by the Reed Gambee families. Bennitt gave parcels of his farmland for the Omar Chapel and Cemetery in 1842, and Baptist and Methodist congregations shared the chapel until 1859. Abolitionism was undoubtedly preached and discussed there, and some who aided runaways and worshipped at the Omar Chapel are buried nearby.