The Slave Haven Underground Railroad Museum occupies the Burkle Estate, a modest antebellum house in North Memphis that served as a station on the Underground Railroad before and during the Civil War. The museum tells the history of slavery in Memphis and the Mid-South, and the story of the network of people — both Black and white — who organized and supported the escape of enslaved people north toward freedom.
The exhibits are relatively small but the subject is handled with seriousness and the specific Memphis and Mississippi Delta context is well-explained. Memphis, as a major river city close to the slave states of Mississippi and Arkansas, occupied a particular position in both the plantation economy and the resistance to it. The museum makes that position clear. It is a short distance from the Victorian Village district and can be combined with a visit there.