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Dinsmore Township School District #4 was formed in 1865following a decision by the township’s board of education that a school would be built in the center of every four sections of land, or every four square miles. This placement of school buildings gave township children the opportunity to attend school close to home and the chance at receiving a public education up to the eighth grade, Nine districts were created for the children of white households, and an additional district was formed to educate the children of the African American families, for a total of ten districts in the township. On June 11, 1866, the Dinsmore Township School Board purchased land from George Wenger to build the District #4 school near the intersection of Ohio Route 274 and Wenger Road. (Continued on other side)
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When St. Paul’s Methodist Episcopal Church was dedicated on January 6, 1884, an ornate brass chandelier presented by the Edison Electric Light Company provided illumination for the ceremony. Wired for electric lighting before its completion, St. Paul’s was one of the first churches in the nation lighted by Edison lamps. The Tiffin Edison Electric Illuminating Company, the first central electric power station in Ohio and the tenth in the United States, was built in Tiffin in late 1883. With a 100 horsepower boiler, a 120 horsepower engine, and two dynamos, it supplied direct current sufficient to light 1,000 lamps. It stood two blocks north of this site. The original brass “electrolier” still hangs in the sanctuary inside.
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The author of fifteen novels, ten plays, and more than 100 stories, Dawn Powell was born in 1896 in Mount Gilead at 53 West North Street and grew up in Shelby. She graduated from Lake Erie College in Painesville and moved to New York in 1918. Although some of her early works, such as She Walks in Beauty (1928) and The Bride’s House (1929), draw from her life in small-town Ohio, she is best known for her satiric portrayals of life in New York, including A Time to Be Born (1942) and The Wicked Pavilion (1954). Often compared to Dorothy Parker and associated with contemporaries John Dos Passos, Edmund Wilson, Ernest Hemingway, and Gore Vidal, Powell received the Marjorie Peabody Waite Award for lifelong achievement in literature in 1964. She died in New York in 1965.
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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)
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Frances Rappaport Horwich was born in Ottawa on July 16, 1907, the daughter of Sam Rappaport, an Austrian immigrant who operated a general store, and Rosa Gratz Rappaport, a Russian immigrant. The youngest of six children, she attended the Ottawa elementary school and graduated from Ottawa High School in 1924. After high school, she attended the University of Chicago where she earned a bachelor’s degree in philosophy and taught first grade for three years. “Miss Frances,” as she was called, then earned a master’s degree from Columbia University in 1933 and a Ph.D. in 1942 from Northwestern University. From 1942 to 1952, she was involved in teaching and education development. The basic education she received in the Ottawa schools enabled her to achieve great skills and abilities. [continued on other side]
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Seeking an alternative transportation route to distant markets, many farmers and manufacturers in Ohio wanted to connect the Ohio River to Lake Erie with a canal. Beginning in Cleveland the Ohio-Erie Canal ran south, the length of the state, to Portsmouth. The canal was a total of 308 miles long, 40 feet wide at the surface, and 4 feet deep. The Ohio-Erie Canal opened for traffic along its entire length in 1832 and consequently effected great change. Population along the canal increased, and commercial, political, and industrial growth in Ohio boomed. Products grown and manufactured in this previously isolated region now had access to world markets. Profits for farmers and merchants increased, and the entire state economy was bolstered. With the rise of railroads in the 1860s, however, canals were destined to become obsolete because the railroad was a faster and more dependable means of transportation. The canal system ceased to operate altogether after a disastrous flood in 1913.
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In 1893, Ohio and Indiana constructed the first Union School on the state line separating Ohio and Indiana. For 111 years, students from both states have been educated in what is the only schoolhouse located in Ohio and Indiana. In 1925, a new Union School was designed to replace the old schoolhouse. The dedication of this new school building took place on December 21, 1926. A new addition was added in 2004. The Union School Building has special architectural features such as a center stone placed on the Ohio and Indiana state line and Ohio and Indiana arched doorways. The bell from the 1893 Union School is displayed to the south side of the current school.
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Two Deputy U.S. General Land Office Surveyors traversed Goll Woods: Benjamin Hough in 1815 and Captain James Riley in 1821. Hough (1772-1819) established the Michigan Meridian in 1815 and was county and state office holder in Ohio. Riley’s life was more tumultuous. Riley (1777-1840) captained the merchant ship Commerce, which wrecked off the Saharan coast in 1815. Riley and crew were enslaved for four months until ransomed by British diplomat William Willshire. In 1817, Riley published a famous account of his time in North Africa, and, in 1819, was appointed a surveyor by Surveyor General Edward Tiffin. Moving to Northwest Ohio, Riley named the village he founded in 1822, Willshire, for his deliverer. Riley returned to New York in 1826 and to the sea, where he died. Riley’s book went through more than twenty editions by 1860 and Abraham Lincoln credited the account as one that influenced him deeply.