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Construction of Waverly’s third church, built with locally produced brick, began in 1859 and was completed in 1860. The original deed, recorded on October 31, 1859, listed the value of the lot as $180. With the merger of the Evangelical Synod of North America with the Reformed Church in 1934, the name changed to Evangelical and Reformed Church. A merger in 1957 with the Congregational Christian Church changed the name to First United Church of Christ. In 1987 it became known as Waverly United Church of Christ, until its dissolution in 1992, when the building was given to Pike Heritage Foundation Museum. Original records and services were in German. In 1890 some English was introduced in services, and by the early 1900s was used on alternate Sundays. The church was remodeled and enlarged in 1869, but retains much of its original appearance. An annex was added to the church in 1959.
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The Temple of Rumley Church is of one of two remaining buildings in what once was Rumley, a thriving African American community in Shelby County. On May 19, 1837, the village was surveyed for Amos Evans, who built his hewed log dwelling and store. Brothers Joel and George Goings (aka. Goens), freed black men from Monongalia County, Virginia, purchased 80 acres of land that same year. They settled with their families near Rumley in Van Buren Township along with other free men and women of color, including former slaves. Joel Goings erected the first brick house in 1841, using bricks from his own brickyard. By 1846, the Rumley community stretched over 7,000 acres and included the Collins, Redman, Williams, Davis, Lett, and Brown families. (Continued on other side)
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In the mid-1700s, France found its influence waning among midwestern tribes as it contested for Native American trade and military alliances with Great Britain. Shortly after Miami chief Memeskia (also known as Old Britain or La Demoiselle) moved his village to Pickawillany, British traders were given permission to establish a small post in the village, which was deep in the territory claimed by France. When French demands to evacuate the post failed, Charles Langlade led a party of 250 Ottawa and Ojibwe warriors and French Canadians in a surprise attack on the Miami village on June 21, 1752. The trading post was destroyed, British traders were taken to Detroit as prisoners, and Memeskia was executed. Pickawillany was completely abandoned soon after. As a prelude to the French and Indian War, the Battle of Pickawillany fueled land claim and trading right conflicts between France and Britain.
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This site, at the head of the Great Rapids of the Maumee, has been a major river crossing for centuries. The village was platted in 1833 as Gilead but was overshadowed by rival Providence during the canal era. In 1868 the name Grand Rapids was adopted, and the town prospered with the arrival of the railroad in 1877. Fires ravished the village in the late 1890s and spring floods have remained a threat. Restoration of the Victorian architecture began in 1975 and has helped revitalize this village along the historic Maumee.
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Seba Bronson Jr. left Columbia Township in early 1810 and followed the Rocky River to an area one and a half miles north of here. He built a cabin and planted a crop and thus started what became known as the village of Hardscrabble in Liverpool Township. The village was centered around the Columbia/Grafton Road area, and the township is the oldest continuously inhabited township in Medina County. The Potawatami Indians occupied this area and camped annually along the Rocky River. For five silver dollars, they showed Seba and a partner a hidden salt springs which they sought to exploit. Other men also scrabbled to own it and Justus Warner succeeded. Seba was turned out. Warner operated the Liverpool Salt Works beginning in 1811. The first industry in the county, salt was a necessity and eagerly sought by setters in the area.
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Clinton County was a major center of activity for the Shawnee, Miami, and Delaware Indians. Early traces and trails developed as Indians traveled from village to village; gathered flint, salt and gold; traded furs, mica, and feldspar; and hunted bear, deer, otters, raccoons, foxes, wild cats, turkeys, and other wildlife. Trails throughout the county connected to other trails and villages in Ohio such as Lower Shawnee Town (now Portsmouth), Hurricane Tom’s Town (now Piketon), Chillicothe, Old Town (near Xenia), and Miami Town (now Dayton). Major trails or traces in Clinton County included the Bullskin, Wayne, Chillicothe, Delaware, Fort Ancient, Kanawha, Kenton and Todds Fork Traces. These routes were the avenues the first white settlers followed. (continued on other side)
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A Shaker village called Watervliet, Ohio, was located here from 1806-1900. The Shakers, originally called the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, were followers of Mother Ann Lee who came from Manchester, England in 1774 and established the first Shaker community in Watervliet, New York. The tenets of the religion included communal living, celibacy, and public confession of sins. The frenzied dance movements, which were part of the worship of their sect, gave the members the name “Shakers.” Attracted by the great Kentucky revivals in the late 1700s and early 1800s, Eastern Shaker missionaries came west to find converts and establish communities. A discontented Presbyterian congregation in the Beaver Creek area called Beulah was the nucleus for the Watervliet Shaker community. (continued on other side)
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The completion of the Miami and Erie Canal passing through Napoleon in 1843 provided a way to receive manufactured goods, export farm products, and power local mills. The early industries of Napoleon utilized the canal as a source of reliable water power, which led to the development of a mid-19th-century industrial waterfront. Some of the local businesses that relied on the canal were Sayger’s Saw-mill (1843), John Ritter Flouring Mill (1850), Augustin Pilliod’s Napoleon Flouring Mill (1853), and the Napoleon Woolen Mill (1863). These mills used flumes, or artificial channels, to divert canal water to their water wheels. These brick-arch flumes were instrumental in bringing Napoleon into the national economy.
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