Visiting a Freedom Station with Cincinnati Opera

On Sunday, I drove to Ripley to meet up with cast members, the creative team and their families to tour the John P. Parker House and the Rev. John Rankin House in Ripley, as a prelude to "Rise for Freedom: The John P. Parker Story," premiering Oct. 13-21 at the Aronoff Center. Here are some of my photo impressions.

Top to bottom:
Terry Cook (John P. Parker); Cook with David Gonzalez, the librettist at the John Rankin home; Andrea Jones-Sojola (Miranda Parker) pauses to read a marker at the Parker home; a surprise visitor at the Parker House -- Elizabeth Rankin Fulcher, a great-great-granddaughter of Rev. Rankin, with Ariss Payne, 10, an SCPA student who is in the cast; stage director Sheila Ramsey enjoys a quiet moment; C.J. Hughes, 9, climbs up all 131 stairs once used by fugitive slaves; the canoe in center of this photo carries David Gonzalez, a free spirit who hitched a ride, and then jumped into the river (it wasn't his first time...); the whole cast.