, OH
Built in 1822, this native limestone structure was the home of Benajah Wolcott, first keeper of the Marblehead Lighthouse (originally called the Sandusky Bay Light), and his second wife, Rachel Miller Wolcott. Benajah maintained the lighthouse from 1822 until his death ten years later. After Benajah’s passing the U.S. Government appointed Rachel as the keeper, making her the first female lighthouse keeper on the Great Lakes. The building is the oldest known residence still standing in Ottawa County and is a fine example of a “hall-and-parlor house,” an early American home design.
, OH
The first African-American elected to government office in the United States, John Mercer Langston (1829-1897) won the office of Clerk of Brownhelm Township on April 2, 1855. Born in Virginia and raised in Chillicothe, Langston graduated from Oberlin College in 1849 and was admitted to the Ohio Bar in 1854, becoming Ohio’s first black attorney. He served as the first president of the National Equal Rights League in 1864, and subsequently as professor of law, dean, and acting president of Howard University in Washington, D.C. In 1890, he became Virginia’s first black congressman. Throughout his career Langston set a personal example of self-reliance in the struggle for justice for African-Americans.
, OH
In 1817 the United States government signed a treaty with a number of Native American tribes in northern Ohio, including the Seneca Indians. The Fort Meigs or Maumee Rapids Treaty bound the Seneca tribe to cede all claims to land north of the Greenville Treaty line, and in return they received a 40,000 acre reservation at Lower Sandusky (Fremont) and a $500 annuity to be paid each year in perpetuity. The reservation’s boundary began 1.5 miles north of here and extended 6.5 miles to the south. The width of the reservation was 8 miles with the western boundary at the Sandusky River. Beginning in 1830, with a policy of Indian removal developed by the administration of Andrew Jackson, tribes east of the Mississippi River were pressured to move to reservations in the West. The Seneca Indians moved to northeast Oklahoma in 1831.
, OH
Founded in 1921 as the Weaver Aircraft Company and located in Lorain, Ohio, the Waco Aircraft Company relocated to Troy in March 1923. It was the first aircraft company to use assembly line production and shock strut landing gear. Leading all civilian aircraft production at a ratio of two to one from 1927-1929, the company had sales distributors in 24 countries worldwide. The United States government became the prime contractor of Waco Aircraft Company’s troop/cargo gliders (CG-4A) used extensively during World War II. The company also managed the U.S. Army’s glider program for 15 companies that produced gliders nationwide. The last WACO, model W “Aristrocrat,” was built in Troy in June 1947.
, OH
The United States declared war on Germany in April 1917. Largely through the efforts of Chillicothe attorney John Poland, the War Department selected Chillicothe as the site of an army training camp for inductees from Ohio, West Virginia, and western Pennsylvania. Construction began at Camp Sherman, named for Civil War general William Tecumseh Sherman, in June 1917. When the first recruits arrived in September, more than fourteen thousand workers had erected two thousand buildings on the 1,700-acre site. The rapid influx of soldiers increased Chillicothe’s population from 16,000 to 60,000.
, OH
The first Northwest Territory assembly formally met in Cincinnati in September 1799 to initiate self-government. The legislators were deeply divided politically. The Republicans (antifederalists or “Jeffersonians”), led by Thomas Worthington and Edward Tiffin of Chillicothe, opposed the appointed government headed by the Federalist governor, Arthur St. Clair. They saw it as arbitrary and autocratic and recognized that change could occur only with statehood. To deter the movement, the St. Clair faction in 1801 divided the territory and removed the capital from Chillicothe to Cincinnati. Their actions triggered a violent confrontation led by the antifederalist Michael Baldwin who incited the local rabble-rousers, known as “the Bloodhounds,” to riot in the streets of Chillicothe. Both political unrest and advancing settlement accelerated the Chillicothe faction’s campaign for Ohio statehood.
, OH
Named for General Zebulon Pike, killed in the War of 1812, Pike County was organized in February 1815. Commissioners were charged with establishing a county seat and on May 12, 1815 accepted a conveyance of 40 acres from Elisha Fitch. The new seat was named “Piketon.” In 1816, the commissioners let a contract for the construction of a courthouse and jail. A fine two story courthouse with brick laid in Flemish bond was finished in 1819. A fire destroyed some country courthouse offices on October 9, 1844. The repaired courthouse was the seat of county government until 1861 and is part of the Piketon Historic District, which was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974. Limestone headers above the windows have the names of the county government offices.
, OH
In 1870, African American men in Circleville attempted to vote in municipal elections. Despite the recent ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment, pollsters refused their votes on the basis that state law forbade them from receiving the ballots. The Second Baptist Church was the site of a meeting of 147 African American men seeking redress. Together with Republican leaders these men produced petitions that were sent to the United States Senate and House of Representatives. These petitions gave the Republican Party the grounds to introduce bills to enforce the Fifteenth and Fourteenth Amendments. The passage of the Enforcement Act of 1870 imposed criminal penalties for interference with the right to vote and also helped to shift power and authority from the individual state legislatures to the centralized Federal government.