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In 1819, the State of Ohio formally recognized Shelby County, named for Isaac Shelby, veteran of the American Revolution and former governor of Kentucky. The first county seat was located in Hardin, but was moved to Sidney in 1820 to centralize county government. The corner stone of the present courthouse was laid on July 4, 1881. George Maetzel from Columbus served as architect and superintendent of construction. Modeled after the county courthouse in Licking County, the project was completed in 1883 at a cost of $200,000. Materials, such as limestone, sandstone, and marble arrived by canal boat. The French Second Empire style building has four symmetrical sides facing the four points of the compass, each side with pillared porticoes approached by broad stone steps. A figure of Lady Justice holding the scales of equal justice surmounts each facade. The roof is classical mansard, and the center170-foot tower is of galvanized iron, encompassing four clocks.
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Sciotoville Bridge, 1917, designed and built by two famous American Civil Engineers, Gustav Lindenthal, D.Sc. (1850-1935), the Consulting Engineer (and) David Barnard Steinman, D.Sc. (1887-1960), the designer and stress analyst. A double track railroad bridge of twin spans each 775 feet long, it remained until 1935 the longest continuous truss bridge in the world and stands today as the prototype for continuous structures. Its construction marked a major advance in the art of bridge engineering and was a pioneer achievement in continuous truss analysis. In beauty of design, size and erection techniques it stands as a landmark of progress in man’s mastery of his environment.
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Described as a Columbus “institution” when he died in 1969, Emerson C. Burkhart was born on a farm in Union Township, Putnam County in 1905. The son of Albert and Nora Burkhart, Emerson graduated from Kalida High School in 1924 and from Ohio Wesleyan University in 1927. After studying art in Provincetown, Massachusetts and in New York City, he settled in Columbus and, in 1937, married Mary Ann Martin, an artists’ model who devoted herself to his career. Burkhart was a prolific painter and completed an estimated 3,000 pictures during his 40-year career, including street scenes, rural landscapes, and more than 250 self-portraits, once noting his face was “cheaper than a model’s and always there.”
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In September 1786, Captain Benjamin Logan of Kentucky captured a young Indian boy during a raid across the Ohio River on the Machachac tribe towns of the Shawnee nation. Upon returning to Kentucky, Captain Logan made the 14 year old boy part of his family until he was forced by treaty to return him to his native people. From the period of residence in Kentucky to the time of his death, Johnny Logan, as he was named, was a friend of the United States. Following the declaration of war against England in 1812, he joined the American service. He was employed by the Indian Agent John Johnston at Piqua to help evacuate Ohio women and children living near Fort Wayne. The siege of that fort was later lifted by the combined force of Kentucky and Ohio troops under the command of General William Henry Harrison. [continued on other side]
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The Windsor Township Baptist Association was organized January 11, 1818 by Elder William Davis with 35 members who met in homes, barns and schoolhouses. At the death of the six-year-old granddaughter of Samuel and Tabitha Davis Henery, this plot by the river was laid out of a church yard and deeded by John Henery in 1837. In 1838 a brick church was built at the cost of $1,000. It served this community until the road and church were destroyed by the flood of 1913. More than 50 men from this area served in the Civil War. Twenty-six War of 1812 veterans are buried here as well as William Davis, veteran of the American Revolution; Obadiah Brokaw, founder of Big Bottom State Memorial; and Captain Isaac Newton Hook, river pilot at the age of ten and U.S. master of inland navigation, 1860-1873, who ran supplies on the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers for the Union Army. At Captain Hook’s death in 1906, the steamers Valley Gem, Zanesville, and Sonoma from Marietta in his honor landed passengers at the church here for his funeral, “largest ever held in the Muskingum Valley.” “The Lord and the River giveth and then taketh away.”
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On a stormy autumn morning in 1925, the giant Navy airship, christened Shenandoah, crashed near this site. Initially, the Shenandoah was commissioned to perform scouting missions for the Navy; however, she would soon be flying promotional missions. The Shenandoah had recently begun a six-day publicity tour across the Midwest when she crashed. The turbulent weather of late summer created strong winds, which ripped the 680-feet long Shenandoah in two and tore the control car from the keel. A majority of the 14 crewmen who died in the crash, including the captain, Lt. Commander Zachary Lansdowne of Greenville, Ohio, were killed when the control car plummeted to the ground. The stern section fell in a valley near Ava and the bow was carried southwest nearly twelve miles before landing near Sharon, Ohio. The Ohio National Guard was called in to control the crowds of spectators who traveled to the crash sites.
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Augustus West, an African American, was born in Madison County, Virginia on March 20, 1814, and moved to Ohio in 1837. Legend has it that West was a runaway slave and worked as a farm laborer before designing a scheme to purchase his own farm. West, with abolitionist Alexander Beatty, traveled into slave territory no fewer than three times where the pair would sell West, help him escape, and split the profits. After splitting the profits, West used his portion of the money to purchase 177 acres of land in Fayette County where he built his “mansion.” To remain inconspicuous and secure, West built the “mansion” as far from the main road as possible. (continued on other side)
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The Wakeman Red Caps, perhaps one of the area’s best semi-pro baseball teams during the 1930s and 40s, first played night baseball under lights installed at Wakeman Field on July 24, 1935. The Field, no longer extant, was bounded by Hyde, Clark, Pleasant, and Townsend (Ohio Route 303) streets. The game was played only two months after Franklin D. Roosevelt switched on lights at Crosley Field for the Cincinnati Reds. The Red Caps were part of the Wakeman Baseball Club, an organization which was founded in 1889 and was sponsored by Charles S. Clark, Sr., and others. For aspiring local baseball players, playing night baseball for the Red Caps was a great honor. Wakeman Field was annually graced with Abe Saperstein’s Ethipian Clowns, an African-American traveling baseball team, and also saw appearances by Tom Manning, Satchel Paige, Josh Gibson, Al Schacht, Jesse Owens, and other sports greats.