Remarkable Ohio

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66 E. Broad Street
Pataskala

, OH

Born in New Jersey, Richard and Sarah Conine, the founders of the village of Pataskala, moved to Lima Township and lived on this site as early as 1821 when Richard established a grist mill nearby. Their homestead also served as a stagecoach stop on the mud pike between Columbus and Newark prior to the coming of the railroad. Richard platted “Conine Town” south and west of here in 1851, and the town was renamed Pataskala soon after. The public-spirited Conines contributed to the building of several area schools and churches and donated land for the Pataskala Cemetery. After their deaths, Sarah’s nephew Jacob Van Dorn inherited the property. John Hawley purchased the home in 1887 and for many years it was known as “The Hawley House.” It was demolished in 1964 to make way for commercial development.

Just E of 33775 Hiram Trail
Moreland Hills

, OH

Hiram House was Ohio’s first settlement house and among the earliest in the nation, opening in October 1896 in Cleveland’s Whiskey Island neighborhood. Representing the ideals of a late-1800s urban progressive movement, settlement houses provided–through “service, not charity” –health, recreational, and self-development opportunities that were not widely available in this era. Founded by Hiram College divinity graduate George A. Bellamy (1872-1960), Hiram House administered a wide range of social services for people of different ethnic and economic backgrounds. Bellamy established the “Fresh Air Camp” circa 1900; Cleveland industrialist Samuel Mather donated this tract of land in 1903. In continuous operation since its founding, Hiram House has provided outdoor experiences and educational programs for thousands of Ohio children.

73 S. Professor Street
Oberlin

, OH

Aluminum pioneer Charles Martin Hall was born in 1863 in Thompson, Ohio (Geauga County), and moved with his family to Oberlin in 1873. Hall graduated from Oberlin College in 1885, studying chemistry under Professor Frank Fanning Jewett (1844-1926). Jewett, who lived in this house from 1884 to 1923, encouraged Hall’s interest in chemistry and aluminum, then a semi-precious metal. Hall discovered an electrochemical reduction process for producing metallic aluminum from aluminum oxide dissolved in molten cryolite in his woodshed laboratory at his family’s home at 64 East College Street on February 23, 1886. This process, the culmination of research with Jewett, became the basis for the aluminum industry in America. In 1888 Hall co-founded the Pittsburgh Reduction Company, later the Aluminum Company of America (ALCOA). Upon his death in 1914, Hall left one-third of his estate to Oberlin College.

301 Grant St
Dennison

, OH

From its founding in 1865, Dennison was a railroad town and became the second largest rail center for the Pennsylvania Railroad. Rail presence was so strong that the industry dictated social and economic development throughout the community. For example, the Railway Chapel, the historic name for the First Presbyterian Church of Dennison was built because W.W. Card, Pennsylvania Railroad Superintendent, saw a spiritual need in the community. As the first church built in Dennison, Card contacted the Presbytery of Steubenville to start the church, arranged for donation of land, provided for financing from railway officials, and arranged for labor and material from the railroad. Railroad workers constructed the furnishing for the church with walnut pews built by the Dennison Car Shops. The pews have reversible backs, designed after ones in passenger cars. The church was dedicated in April 1871 and listed on the National Register of Historical Places in 2009.

751 Alpha Road
Beavercreek

, OH

In the late 1790s General Benjamin Whiteman built near this site one of the first log cabins in Alpha, the first settlement in what would become Beavercreek Township of Greene County. The cabin, later owned by Whiteman’s father-in-law, Owen Davis, and leased for use as a tavern to Peter Borders, became the first courthouse of Greene County. Twenty-five feet square, it had one room below and a chamber above, serving as the family sleeping quarters. A small ladder through a hole in the ceiling reached the upper level. The building was constructed of burr oak logs with a roof made of clapboards held in place by long poles laid across them. Considered to be one of the finest houses in that part of the county, the cabin had one door, one window, and a huge fireplace with an outside chimney built of sticks, stones, and clay. (Continued on other side)

Carlisle Area Historical Society Museum, 453 Park Drive
Carlisle

, OH

Carlisle Station Depot. The Carlisle depot for the Cincinnati, Hamilton & Dayton (CH&D) railroad was located nearby. The CH&D started operations in 1851 and was the second railroad through Warren County. Carlisle Station was a passenger and freight-shipping depot and was joined in 1872 by another, when Cincinnati & Springfield Railroad (later part of the Big Four and the New York Central Railroads) erected a depot in nearby Franklin. Carlisle was originally known as the “Jersey Settlement,” because many settlers in the early 1800s were from New Jersey. George Carlisle, vice-president of the CH&D, purchased a large tract of land here. After Carlisle and his wife Sarah donated a lot to the community in 1856, residents renamed the place “Carlisle Station.” The Carlisle Literary Association built a hall on the lot c. 1856, which, as of 2019, remains as the older section of Carlisle’s municipal building. Side B: Schenck-Stanton Rally, October 3, 1868.

142 E Fifth St
Zoar

, OH

Designed by their leader, Joseph M. Bimeler, the Meeting House is the second house of worship used by the Society of Separatists of Zoar. Men and women entered through separate front doors: men used the right door and women the left. Bimeler and his successors gave “discourses” (not sermons) from a table located between the doors. The Meeting House has been in continuous use since it was built in 1853 and as of 2011 houses the Zoar United Church of Christ.

5995 Horseshoe Bend Rd
Troy

, OH

The 1804 Iddings House is the oldest structure on its original site in Miami County. A second generation American and cousin to General “Mad” Anthony Wayne, Benjamin Iddings brought his wife, Phoebe, and six of their ten children up the Stillwater River into Newton Township and constructed the log house in 1804. In 1976 the structure was placed on the National Register of Historic Places with an initial restoration in 1981. Thanks to community support, further restoration was completed in 2006.