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Envisioned as a rural cemetery with careful attention to landscaping design and symmetrical lots, the Riverview Cemetery was established in 1883 on forty acres of land. The chapel was a gift to Riverview from the Grand Army of the Republic, mostly Civil War veterans, and was dedicated on Memorial Day 1899. Plaques inside the chapel list 702 men from Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia who served in the Civil War, including 311 who are memorialized or buried at Riverview. There are also plaques listing soldiers killed in World Wars I and II, Korea, and Vietnam. The rich history of East Liverpool and Columbiana County is documented in the burials at Riverview Cemetery.
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John Anderson Ward had this Federal style house constructed from 1823-1825 on land inherited from his father, Urbana’s founder Colonel William Ward. The Colonel’s will stipulated that a local mason use 26,500 bricks to build the house and be paid $80.00. The original house is thought to have had four rooms, two rooms each on the first and second floors and both divided by central hallways. John and his wife Eleanor Ward reared seven children in the house, two of whom became nationally recognized artists, John Quincy Adams Ward and Edgar Melville Ward. The farmstead, consisting of 172 acres, was also the site of a huge feast held in honor of General William Henry Harrison’s visit to Champaign County during his 1840 presidential campaign. Twelve 300 foot-long tables were spread across the lawn where thousands of people from the surrounding countryside dined on barbecued beef and lamb and drank barrels of cider.
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In 1869 a secret organization, The Knights of Labor, was founded in Philadelphia. The K.O.L. promoted an ideal society based on bettering life for others with the slogans, “labor was the first capital” and “an injury to one is the concern of all.” Shawnee’s Local Assembly #169 Knights of Labor was organized in 1876, and quickly became a powerful voice for labor in Ohio. National labor leader, William T. Lewis, later Labor Commissioner of Ohio, taught free grammer classes at night for the miners. Lewis initiated “The Ohio Plan,” the first free empployment bureaus in the United States. William H. Bailey, later head of National District Assembly #135 of Miners and T.L. Lewis, President of the United Mine Workers in 1910, also started their careers here. Meetings involving these leaders led to the formation of the United Mine Workers in 1890. (Continued on other side)
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Organized in 1845, Zion African Methodist Episcopal Church is the oldest congregation of African descent in Delaware, with Reverend Daniel Winslow serving as the first minister. In 1853 the cornerstone of the first church was laid, which was dedicated in 1855. Three former Pastors of Zion became Bishops in the AME Church–James A. Shorter, 1868; John Mifflin Brown, 1868; and Cornelius T. Shaffer, 1900. In 1876 the existing church was razed and carpenter, brick mason, and plaster church members built the present edifice. A fire destroyed the interior on December 19, 1983, and for two years the congregation met in the recreation building of the Londontown Apartments, undercroft of the William Street Methodist Church, and sanctuary of the Victory Seventh Day Adventist Church. On the first Sunday in October 1985, Presiding Elder Virgil Cummins, Pastor Rodney Thomas, and the congregation marched from the Adventist Church back into the restored sanctuary.
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On January 19, 1835, Reverend Steven Barnes led sixteen men and women to establish the Weymouth Congregational Church at the home of Lathrop Seymour. From its beginnings, the congregation opposed slavery. In 1848, it adopted resolutions condemning the “peculiar institution” and asserting that Black people are “our brother[s] ‘made one blood’ with us.” In 1853, the church hosted public meetings featuring the crusading abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison. A notable example of Greek Revival architecture, the “meetinghouse” itself was built in 1835-’36 and has become the oldest extant church building in Medina County. The porch with Doric columns was added in 1854. The Historical American Building Survey documented the building in 1936. Struggling as a Congregational denomination, the sactuary became the home of the non-denominational Weymouth Community Church in 1920, remaining so until 2018.
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On July 3, 1872, 16 men and a 9-year old boy descended the 170 foot shaft in the Atwater Coal Company Mine located in Atwater Township south of Route 224 and East of Route 225. The mine was situated on the property known as the S.G. Shaffer Farm. By mid-day, 7 miners survived the brutal fire in the mine. Richard Roberts, Robert Roberts, William Roberts, Thomas Maines, Joseph Otey, John Williams, John Howells, John Jones and 9-year old George Hufford gave their lives to the first Mining Disaster in Ohio and the 19th mining disaster in the United States since 1839 with more than 5 fatalities. In 1873, Ohio was the second State to pass a law for the safety of Miners.
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Distinguished citizen, legislator, public servant, and historian born in Bellefontaine, January 23, 1840. A Civil War hero, he was promoted to brigadier general at only 25 years of age. Admitted to the bar in 1866, he practiced in Bellefontaine until 1878 when President Hayes appointed him Collector of Internal Revenue. He was then elected Lieutenant Governor of Ohio in 1885 then served two terms in Congress from 1887 to 1891. Following the Spanish-American War, he was appointed by President McKinley to serve as head of the Insular Commission to establish the new government of Puerto Rico. In 1903 Kennedy published Historical Review of Logan County. Kennedy started the Bellefontaine Tree Commission. Gen. Kennedy’s home was on this site and later served as the Bellefontaine City Building. General Kennedy died on May 6, 1918.
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The William Lafferty Memorial Funeral and Carriage Collection shows the development of the funeral business since the mid-1800s through an exhibit of caskets, funeral clothing, and hearses collected and preserved by James William Lafferty (1912 – 1987). William was a member the fourth generation of Laffertys to serve West Union and Adams County. Characteristic of the early history of the profession, William Voris (W.V.) Lafferty (1830-1922) founded the business in 1848 to meet the demand for caskets, which he, as a furniture and cabinetmaker, was often asked to build. (Continued on other side)
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