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Front Text: Typical of many schoolhouses in the Frankfort area during the 1800s, this school, with its pot-bellied stove and flip-top desks, was part of the public school system of that era. The building and its contents have been restored by the citizens of Frankfort in conjunction with the Budd Company. Back Text: Blank
Address: 3186 County Road 550, Frankfort
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Front Text: On this site, on January 4-7, 1808, the six Masonic lodges then existent in the state met and formed the Grand Lodge of Ohio. General Rufus Putnam of Marietta was elected the first Grand Master. Because of advanced age and failing health, he declined the honor and Governor Samuel Huntington was named in his stead. Back Text: Same
Address: 21 W. Main Street, Chillicothe
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Front Text: Ross County's first courthouse was Ohio's first statehouse. The courthouse was erected on the Public Square in 1801. Thomas Worthington, one of the building's superintendents, laid out the foundation. Chillicothe was the last capital of the Northwest Territory, and the final session of the territorial legislature met in the courthouse in 1801. Ohio's first constitution was written here in 1802. On March 1, 1803, Ohio's first General Assembly convened in the building, making it the statehouse. During a time of strained relations between Native Americans and settlers in Ohio, the great Shawnee leader Tecumseh delivered a speech here in 1807 to reassure citizens that the Indians would remain peaceful. The courthouse served as the statehouse from 1803 to 1810 and from 1812 to 1816. The building was razed in 1852 to make way for the present courthouse. Back Text: Same
Address: 2 N. Paint Street, Chillicothe
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Front Text: Presbyterian minister Hugh Stewart Fullerton asked his congregation in 1841: "Shall we endeavor to form an academy to provide better educational advantages to the young citizens of this remote community?" Predating the founding of the town of South Salem, the Salem Academy was built and opened in 1842, its stone coming from a quarry south of Greenfield. Its primary purpose was to prepare ministers and teachers for the West. Professor J.A. Lowes served as principal during the "golden age" of the academy from 1848 to 1858. (continued on other side) Back Text: The Chillicothe Presbytery controlled the Salem Academy from 1859 to 1907. During this period it functioned as a junior college, with its students going on to other institutions after a two-year term. Attendance dropped significantly during the Civil War while many students served in the Union Army. By the time the academy closed in 1907, more than 1,500 students "including three U.S. congressmen and Governor Joseph B. Foraker" had received instruction here. Serving since as a community building, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.
Address: W of Main Street and Church Street Intersection, South Salem
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Front Text: The oldest commercial enterprise in Ohio, the Chillicothe Gazette began publication on April 25, 1800, as Freeman's Journal and Chillicothe Advertiser. That October it became the Scioto Gazette, and Chillicothe has had a Gazette ever since. It is the oldest newspaper in continuous operation west of the Allegheny Mountains, and the second oldest in the United States. Its first publisher and editor, Nathaniel Willis, was a Revolution-era Boston printer who reputedly apprenticed under Benjamin Franklin. Under his leadership the Gazette became one of the most influential papers in the expanding West. It first reported news transmitted by telegraph in 1847 and began daily publication in 1849. The Gazette moved into this building, a replica of Ohio's first statehouse, in 1941. Back Text: Same
Address: 50 W. Main Street, Chillicothe
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Front Text: First Lady Lucy Ware Webb Hayes was born in this four-room Federal Vernacular house in 1831. Well educated for her time, she attended local schools, took classes in the preparatory department of Ohio Wesleyan University in Delaware, and graduated from Wesleyan Female College in Cincinnati in 1850. She married lawyer and future U.S. President Rutherford B. Hayes in 1852. They raised five children to adulthood. As a colonel's wife during the Civil War, "Mother Lucy" boosted morale for the soldiers of the 23rd Ohio Volunteer Infantry regiment. In 1870, during Hayes' first term as governor of Ohio, Lucy helped establish the Ohio Soldiers' and Sailors' Orphans' Home as a state institution. (continued on other side) Back Text: During Rutherford B. Hayes' 1877-1881 presidential term, Mrs. Hayes brought temperance to the White House and established lasting traditions, including the Easter "Egg Roll" and the eagle logo on the White House stationery. Politically astute and forthright, Lucy earned widespread admiration and became the first "First Lady" so titled. She died in 1889 and is interred at Spiegel Grove in Fremont. Built circa 1825 and rented in 1826 by Lucy' parents, Dr. James and Maria Cook Webb, the house was moved here from its original East Fourth Street location in 1883. The Chillicothe Restoration Foundation saved it from demolition in 1968. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973 as part of the Chillicothe Old Residential District. The Ross County Commissioners completed restoration in 1985.
Address: 90 W. Sixth Street, Lucy Hayes Heritage Center, Chillicothe
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Front Text: The United States declared war on Germany in April 1917. Largely through the efforts of Chillicothe attorney John Poland, the War Department selected Chillicothe as the site of an army training camp for inductees from Ohio, West Virginia, and western Pennsylvania. Construction began at Camp Sherman, named for Civil War general William Tecumseh Sherman, in June 1917. When the first recruits arrived in September, more than fourteen thousand workers had erected two thousand buildings on the 1,700-acre site. The rapid influx of soldiers increased Chillicothe's population from 16,000 to 60,000. Back Text: The worldwide Spanish influenza epidemic arrived at Camp Sherman in September 1918. Of the 8,000 people infected, 1,100 died within two months. Two hundred German prisoners were interned here from July 1918 to September 1919. Four divisions -- 123,581 men -- trained at Camp Sherman. The 83rd and 84th divisions went overseas, but the 95th and 96th did not complete training before the November 1918 armistice. Discharges began within days and were completed by July 1920. The government sold the buildings but retained the land., now the site of two correctional facilities and the Veterans Administration Hospital.
Address: Camp Sherman Memorial Park, SR 104, Chillicothe
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Front Text: The first Northwest Territory assembly formally met in Cincinnati in September 1799 to initiate self-government. The legislators were deeply divided politically. The Republicans (antifederalists or "Jeffersonians"), led by Thomas Worthington and Edward Tiffin of Chillicothe, opposed the appointed government headed by the Federalist governor, Arthur St. Clair. They saw it as arbitrary and autocratic and recognized that change could occur only with statehood. To deter the movement, the St. Clair faction in 1801 divided the territory and removed the capital from Chillicothe to Cincinnati. Their actions triggered a violent confrontation led by the antifederalist Michael Baldwin who incited the local rabble-rousers, known as "the Bloodhounds," to riot in the streets of Chillicothe. Both political unrest and advancing settlement accelerated the Chillicothe faction's campaign for Ohio statehood. Back Text: According to the census of 1800, the Northwest Territory had a population of 45,365, far short of the 60,000 required under the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 to form a new state. However, the territory's rapid growth prompted the U.S. House of Representatives to form a committee early in 1802 to report on the prospect of statehood. Following a favorable report, the House passed an enabling bill, which was approved by the Senate and signed as the Enabling Act by President Thomas Jefferson on April 30, 1802. The following December, Thomas Worthington traveled from Chillicothe to Washington D.C. to deliver Ohio's Constitution to Congress for ratification. The constitution upheld the principles of the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 and prohibited slavery in Ohio. On March 1, 1803, Ohio became the seventeenth state admitted to the Union.
Address: Entrance to Yoctangee Park, W. Water Street, Chillicothe
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Front Text: Born in Chillicothe in 1872, Burton Stevenson's life was devoted to the written word as a prolific author and anthologist, and as a librarian. Following stints as a journalist while a student at Princeton University and then at newspapers in Chillicothe, Stevenson became the librarian of the city's public library in 1899. He held the post for 58 years. Stevenson helped secure a Carnegie Library for Chillicothe, completed in 1906, and became prominent for his service during World War I. He founded a library at Camp Sherman (an army training camp north of the city), which became a model for others nationally. Back Text: Stevenson then went to Paris as the European director of the Library War Service. After the Armistice in 1918, he established the American Library in Paris and directed it until 1920 and again from 1925 - 1930. In addition to accomplishments as a librarian, he wrote or compiled more than 50 books, including The Mystery of the Boule Cabinet (1912), the Home Book of Quotations (1934), and many works for young people. Stevenson died in 1962. Stevenson Center, at Ohio University-Chillicothe, is named for him.
Address: 140-146 S. Paint Street, Chillicothe
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Front Text: With the Division Act of 1800, the U.S. Congress divided the Northwest Territory at a line essentially the present boundary of Indiana and Ohio. The Indiana Territory stood west of the line. The name Northwest Territory was retained for the land east of the line and Chillicothe became its capital. The legislature for the territory convened in Chillicothe in November 1800. Since there were no public buildings in which the legislature could meet, its session was held in a two-story log house that stood on this site called "Abrams' Big House." It was so called for its owner, Basil Abrams. During the War of 1812, the building served as the barracks for the 19th U.S. Regiment of Infantry. Thereafter, it was known as the "old barracks" until it was razed circa 1840. Back Text: Same
Address: 64 N. Walnut Street, Chillicothe
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Front Text: To provide direction and stability to the economy, Congress created the nation's largest lending agency in 1816, the Second Bank of the United States. Branch banks were established around the country, two of them in Ohio-Chillicothe and Cincinnati. The Chillicothe branch was located in a building on this site. The presence of these branches adversely affected the ability of state chartered and independent banks, which had long printed and lent their own money without the backing of species. When the Secretary of Treasury forced the state chartered and independent banks to redeem their notes in specie, at a time when a sharp recession hit the nation in 1819, a wave of protest arose from those connected with those banks. In February 1819, Ohio's General Assembly levied a tax of $50,000 on each of the two branch banks, and bank officers were given until September 1 to comply with the law. (continued on other side) Back Text: (continued from other side) The state's new bank tax was to be collected by state auditor Ralph Osborn. If payment was refused, Osborn was authorized to search the bank under what has been termed the "crowbar law" and to seize sufficient money to pay the tax. Osborn hired John Harper to collect the tax in Chillicothe, and on September 17, 1819, with help from Chillicotheans Thomas Orr and James McCollister, Harper asked bank officials to comply. When they refused, the three men forced their way into the vault and carried off assets of more than $100,000. Ohio's bank tax, which involved the issue of state versus federal government rights was fought over until the Supreme Court, in the case Osborn v. Bank of the United States, decided in favor of the federal government. The1824 landmark decision, which struck down Ohio's law, was significant as the nation moved further toward recognizing the power of the federal government.
Address: 59 N. Paint Street, Chillicothe
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Front Text: Responding to calls for equality in education for the city's African-American children, the Chillicothe Board of Education established Southern School here in 1874. Led by Principal Joseph D. Hackley and teachers Sara K. Fidler, Jennie Gilmore, George Hackley, and Annie E. Nickens, the school was the first in Chillicothe dedicated to educating African-American students in grades one through six. During its eighty-two year history, Southern School attracted devoted educators, including Anna Hayes, Cora Medley Stewart, and Eva Warner Price (the school's last principal), who each served more than thirty years. Following the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education, which held that segregated schools were unconstitutional, the Citizens' Committee for Southern School petitioned the board of education to end the practice here. In 1955, the board moved the Southern School's primary grades to Central School. The final day for Southern School was June 1, 1956. Back Text: Same
