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Harriet Beecher Stowe was born in Litchfield Connecticut in 1811 and moved to Cincinnati in 1832 when her father, prominent Congregational minister Lyman Beecher became the pastor of the city’s Second Presbyterian Church and president of Lane Theological Seminary. Married to Calvin E. Stowe in 1836, she bore six of the couple’s seven children while living here. Life in the city provided Stowe with the firsthand accounts about the evils of slavery. Already a published writer, she drew upon these experiences and the death of her infant son Charley in 1849 to write Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Published in book form in 1852, Uncle Tom’s Cabin almost single-handedly popularized the cause of anti-slavery, made Stowe famous, and remains an icon of the American anti-slavery movement. A prolific writer, she wrote a book a year for nearly thirty years of her life. After moving from Cincinnati in 1850, the Stowes lived in Brunswick, Maine, Andover, Massachusetts, and Hartford, Connecticut, where she died in 1896.
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In 1833, Samuel Eells founded Alpha Delta Phi (ΑΔΦ), the first fraternity west of the Allegheny Mountains and the first fraternity at Miami University. The formation of Miami’s Alpha (founding) chapters followed in the next two decades. In 1839 Beta Theta Phi (ΒΘΠ) was founded, Miami’s first Alpha chapter. Phi Delta Theta (ΦΔΘ) was founded in 1848 and Sigma Chi (ΣΧ) in 1855, completing the Miami Triad. Miami would become home to two more Alpha chapters with the creation of the sorority Delta Zeta (ΔΖ) in 1902 and what would become Phi Kappa Tau (ΦΚΤ), in 1906. Following Miami’s precedent, approximately 800 chapters of these five “Alphas” have been formed in the United States and internationally. Sharing the title with Union College in Schenectady, New York, Miami University is known as the “Mother of Fraternities”.
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In 1846, the same year that Mahoning County was created, Ohio’s General Assembly passed an act “for the encouragement of agriculture.” An outgrowth of this legislation led to the founding of the Mahoning County Agricultural Society in April 1847. Boasting a membership of 170, the Society agreed to sponsor competitions for premiums to be distributed at an “annual fair and cattle show the next fall.” Canfield was the geographic center of the county and selected as the site for the first fair. In October, from the lawn of the First Congregational Church, Comptroller of the United State Treasury Elisha Whittlesey welcomed participants. Admission was one shilling (twelve and one half cents). The Village Green overflowed with exhibitions of prized livestock, harvests, plowing contests, and horse racing. Early fairs were one-day events attended primarily by gentlemen. However, the church provided a venue for ladies to display their handiwork. (continued on other side)
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Clyde Shyrigh, better known as Billy Clifford, was born in this house on January 24, 1869, to Levi and Sarah Shyrigh. Coming from a musical family, he developed an early interest in music and practiced with the family in the barn behind the house. At the age of ten, Clifford joined the circus when it was in town and played the snare drum, sold tickets, and eventually performed a song and dance routine. A leading vaudevillian of his time, Clifford once performed with Buster Keaton and went on to act with the best troupes in New York City, Baltimore, Norfolk, Richmond, and Europe. Eventually, he created his own company of performers, including an all-girl orchestra. Clifford died in this house on November 20, 1930, and is buried in Oakdale Cemetery in Urbana.
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The Stearns and Foster Company was co-founded by George S. Stearns, one of the founding fathers of the City of Wyoming, and Seth Foster. Family-owned for 139 years, the company saw the nation through three wars and the Great Depression. A few of its contributions to public service include-donating mattresses and drinking water to area residents during the great flood of 1937 and devoting nearly 80% of its resources to the war effort during World War II. In 1911, the company was one of the first to volunteer under what is now known as the Workman’s Compensation Act and offered life insurance to employees free of cost in 1914. The Stearns family contributed greatly to the City of Wyoming, serving on boards and commissions and helping make possible its first church, library, and high school.
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Construction of the Columbus, Piqua, and Indiana Central Railroad started in 1850 and was finished in 1854. Later referred to as the “Panhandle Railroad,” it ran from Columbus to Bradford. During the Civil War, the line carried supplies and troops and it was extended from Bradford to Richmond, Indiana. President Lincoln’s funeral train traveled the route on April 29, 1865. Eventually, three railway lines crossed Urbana: the Big Four, the Pennsylvania, and the Erie. “Corn brooms,” woolen cloth, horse carriages, and tinware were shipped by railroad to national markets and regular passenger service carried residents to destinations across the country, including Chicago, St. Louis, New York, and Washington, D.C. (Continued on other side)
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The Dayton Art Institute, one of the region’s premier fine arts museums, was founded in 1919 as the Dayton Museum of Arts. Founding patrons included Orville Wright, members of the Patterson family, and philanthropist Julia Shaw Patterson Carnell, who donated a mansion for the museum’s first home. In 1923, the museum changed its name to The Dayton Art Institute to reflect the growing importance of its art school, which operated until 1974. After outgrowing its first home, Carnell contributed $2 million for a new building designed by architect Edward B. Green. Completed in 1930 and modeled after two sixteenth century Italian Renaissance villas, the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1974 as a preeminent example of Second Renaissance Revival architecture. As it commemorates its centennial, The Dayton Art Institute continues to serve the community with exhibitions, educational programs, and events.
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Niles’ industrialist James Ward, Sr. built the house that shares his family’s name in 1862. The house has a low-pitched roof, wide, bracketed eaves, and rounded window and door openings, all characteristics of the Italianate style. John R. Thomas, another industrialist, acquired the house in 1887. His daughter Mary Ann Waddell, wife of Jacob Waddell, lived there until 1969. In 1978, the Thomas family deeded the property to the city of Niles and it became the home of the Niles Historical Society. The house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984.
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