Quindaro was part of the struggle to establish and maintain Kansas as a free state during the Civil War period, a quest for freedom that exacted a heavy toll and included the ultimate sacrifice of people such as the abolitionist John Brown. In modern times, the survival of Quindaro also depended on a long fight to save its ruins and preserve its legacy of freedom. In the early 1980s, a plan was approved to turn the Quindaro ruins area into a landfill, but concerned citizens joined together for nearly two decades to stop the landfill and preserve what remained. Their efforts succeeded, and the area became a National Freedom Trails Underground Railroad Network site. From the overlook, ruins of old Quindaro can still be seen, recalling a place through which freedmen and exodusters passed and affirming the belief that no one should be subjected to slavery and that all people are free.
