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John Young included a public square in his town plan of 1798. A one-room log schoolhouse opened in 1803. In the decades that followed, the Market and Federal Street intersection became the social center of Youngstown with wood-frame houses, churches, and an opera house surrounding the square. Horse-drawn streetcars, running from Brier Hill through the square, became the first form of public transportation in 1875. From 1869 to 1969 the nationally known Tod Hotel dominated the southeast corner of the square. Guests included seven U.S. presidents. Federal Street was paved in 1882, and electric street lights were installed in 1886. The “Diamond,” as the square was sometimes called, became the transportation hub of the city, especially after the Market Street Bridge opened in 1899. Marker for “Central Square (1900-2004)” across the street.
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Clark Lane (1823-1907), industrialist and philanthropist, was a son of John Lane (1793-1880) and Rosanah Crum (1795-1877). John came with his family to the Ohio Country when it was still part of the Northwest Territory. As a young man, Clark worked in his family’s blacksmith shop, and eventually helped found Owens, Lane & Dyer Machine Company in 1854. It built agricultural machinery, sawmills, papermaking machines, and other products, initiating Hamilton’s prominence in metals manufacturing. Lane funded the Butler County Children’s Home, an orphanage for over a century, and constructed an octagon house as his residence on Third Street. He built this library in 1866, also as an octagon, and donated it to the people of Hamilton. A 19th century admirer wrote, “The name and generous deeds of Clark Lane will never fade from the memories of a grateful people who have been recipients of his favor.”
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Oran Follett constructed his Sandusky house between 1835 and 1837. The golden sandstone mansion was home to Follett and his family until his death in 1894. Sold to James Flynn and then the Krupp family, the house remained a private residence until rented to the Works Progress Administration in 1935. The Sandusky Board of Education purchased the house in 1939 and used it as the adjacent high school’s Home Economics annex, meeting space, offices, and occasionally as art gallery or dance venue. From 1958 to 1968, it housed the Sandusky School of Practical Nursing. The Sandusky Library took over management of the house in 1973, opening it as museum in 1976. Considered one of the finest Greek Revival mansions in Ohio, the Follett House was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974.
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Built in 1910, the old Ohio Union was the first student union building constructed on a public university campus and the fourth to be built in the United States. Made possible by a direct appropriation from the 77th Ohio General Assembly and private funds raised by students, the building officially opened on January 11, 1911 with considerable fanfare. By erecting a student union building, the university gave official sanction to extracurricular activities. Although there have been seven additions, this Jacobethan Revival style building retains its original exterior form and character. The “Old Ohio Union” was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.
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Marcellus F. Cowdery, Sandusky’s first Public School superintendent, encouraged William D. Curtis to formulate a chalk that did not break easily or scratch chalkboards. Curtis conducted experiments in his kitchen and, using gypsum and limestone deposits from Sandusky Bay, created sticks of pure white, processed chalk. In the late 1860s, he and his brothers-in-law, Marcellus and John S. Cowdery, began producing the chalk from their family home. In 1890, John Whitworth, Curtis’s son-in-law, helped finance the incorporation of The American Crayon Company. The company pioneered high quality art supplies, including wax color crayons and Prang watercolors, used in schoolrooms around the globe. Sandusky’s American Crayon factory that stood at 1706 Hayes Avenue for more than a century, closed production in 2002 and was later demolished.
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In July 1796, the first survey party for the Connecticut Land Company, led by General Moses Cleaveland (1754-1806), landed on the shore of Lake Erie near present-day Ashtabula to lay out the lands of the Connecticut Western Reserve. On July 22, the party arrived at the mouth of the Cuyahoga River, the western boundary line for American settlement established by the Treaty of Greenville, and set up a base camp near this site. On the eastern river bluff the surveyors platted the “capital town” of the Western Reserve and called it Cleaveland; a misspelling later changed the name to Cleveland. The original survey called for a Public Square, surrounded by right-angled streets and uniformly-shaped lots. Cleaveland returned to Connecticut in October to resume his law practice and never returned to Ohio.
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Mesopotamia Village District was listed in the National Register of Historic Places on December 24, 1974. Many consider it to be “the most unspoiled nineteenth century central green type of village in northeastern Ohio.” The district includes houses, commercial buildings, a town hall, churches, and a cemetery. Surrounding the 1600-foot-long public green these structures represent Greek Revival, Gothic Revival, Queen Anne, Italianate, and vernacular architectural styles constructed between 1820 and 1902. One of the oldest buildings in the district is the colonnaded Greek Revival commercial building at the southwest end of the green. Built in the 1820s for early resident Isaac Clark, it was operated as a store by F.C. Peck. Over the ensuing centuries it has served as a barber shop, post office, and an undertakers. (Continued on other side)
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Fout Hall was one of three original buildings on the Bonebrake Theological Seminary campus. Constructed 1920-1923, it was named for Dr. J. E. Fout, who managed campus construction. Bonebrake Seminary was founded in 1871 by Dayton’s United Brethren in Christ Church and became co-educational in 1873. Generous cash and land gifts (1909-1911) enabled the construction of a new campus. Fout Hall, the administration building, and a powerhouse were designed by Dayton architect Frederick J. Hughes in the Jacobethan Revival style. The three-story buff-brick dormitory was the largest of the buildings and cost $250,000. As well as dining hall, laundry, and storage facilities, it featured 12 single rooms, 54 two-room suites, and 6 three-room suites. Fout Hall was an integral part of the National Register listing of the Dayton View Triangle Historic District in 2022.