Remarkable Ohio

Results for: natural-history-geologic-site
Great Miami River Recreational Trail, Taylorsville Metro Park, 2005 U.S. Route 40
Vandalia

, OH

The Village of Tadmor is significant as being the location of one of the most important centers of transportation in early Ohio history. As early as 1809, keelboats were poled up river from Dayton to load and unload freight in the village. By 1837, the Miami and Erie Canal had reached Tadmor, connecting it to the Ohio River in the south and Lake Erie in the north. In the 1830s, the National Road was constructed through Tadmor, connecting it to points east and west. In 1851, the Dayton & Michigan Railroad established freight and passenger service to the growing town. Residents hoped that Tadmor’s strategic location would help it prosper, however, successive flooding on the Great Miami River stifled growth. Tadmor was finally abandoned when a dam constructed by the Miami Conservancy District in 1922 to retain water during flooding made the site uninhabitable.

2427 OH-245
West Liberty

, OH

The first Mt. Tabor Church, a log meetinghouse, was erected on this site in 1816. It stood on land originally selected by Griffith and Martha Evans for a graveyard at the death of their daughter circa 1812. Deeds show the Evans family gave two and one half acres of land “for the purpose of erecting a meetinghouse and establishing a burying site.” Camp meetings, religious gatherings popular in frontier Ohio, were held on the hillside west of the meetinghouse. Simon Kenton was converted at a Mt. Tabor camp meeting in 1819. The log meetinghouse burned in 1824 and was replaced with a brick church on the same spot. In 1881, the present brick church was completed and dedicated.

412 E. Main Street
Oak Hill

, OH

In 1972 a group of Welsh-Americans chartered the Welsh-American Heritage Museum to preserve Welsh history and culture, and to preserve the Welsh Congregational Church. The old brick church was where songs of praises rang, as the Welsh gathered and sang beloved hymns of their homeland in four-part harmony. The church is a link in a long, unbroken chain of memories and still serves the community as a center of Welsh-American activities and a keeper of the community’s heritage. The red dragon and daffodil are symbols of Wales.

Just S of 12816 Sprucevale Road
East Liverpool

, OH

In these fields, formerly the site of the Ellen Conkle farm, notorious Depression-Era desperado Charles Arthur “Pretty Boy” Floyd met his death at the hands of federal agents and members of the East Liverpool Police Department on October 22, 1934. Floyd’s criminal career as a bank robber, who reputedly committed a dozen murders, mostly police officers, caused him to be designated “Public Enemy #1” only three months earlier by J. Edgar Hoover. (Continued on other side)

8230 Columbus Pike
Lewis Center

, OH

Anson Williams visited Ohio in 1834 before he moved to Orange Township. A former resident of New York State, Williams purchased this site and the surrounding 1,000 acres of U.S. Military District lands and hoped to find opportunity for himself and his family. He bought the land for $6.00 an acre from James D. Wolf, who owned the 4,000-acre section three of Orange Township. The Village of Williamsville was laid out with 80 lots in 1836 on both sides of the Columbus and Sandusky Turnpike. Williams built his home and a hotel with a store and tavern. A hotel and tavern, owned by George Gooding and where the stage changed horses, had already been established north of Williamsville. Competition may have led to Williamsville’s decline. A church was built in 1845 and remained until 1900. Anson died in 1847, and his wife Hannah passed away in 1851. Both are buried in nearby Williamsville Cemetery.

7215 Old Town Road
Fultonham

, OH

Vice President Thomas A. Hendricks was born at this site on September 7, 1819. While still a baby, Thomas’ family moved to Indiana and he grew up and rose to prominence in the Hoosier State. Hendricks served consecutively in the Indiana State Legislature and the U.S. House of Representatives during the late 1840s and the 1850s. From 1863 to1869, he was one of Indiana’s U.S. Senators. Hoosiers elected Hendricks to serve as Indiana’s sixteenth governor in 1872, making him the first Democrat to win that office in a northern state after the Civil War. In 1876, vice-presidential candidate Hendricks and his running mate, Samuel Tilden, lost the presidential election to Ohioan Rutherford B. Hayes. Hendricks joined Grover Cleveland on the Democratic party’s presidential ticket in 1884 and won. Hendricks died in 1885, after serving only eight months as vice president.

NE corner of Gallia Pike and Hillcrest Road
Wheelsburg

, OH

The Hillcrest Children’s Home stood near this site in Wheelersburg and opened in 1921 to the first 57 of many children who would come to live there. A 50-room building intended for 100 children, Hillcrest often housed double to triple that number. The extended community supported Hillcrest, providing entertainment, sponsoring activities, and donating presents for the children whose times there left indelible memories. The home closed in 1970 and was razed the following year.

Pine Street/OH 160
Gallipolis

, OH

This 4-acre plot, established ca. 1860 by John Gee, is a burial ground for local colored citizens. John Gee was a religious leader as well as a skilled carpenter who built houses in early Gallipolis. Some Gallipolis colored pioneers were artisans while others came to work in the homes of French settlers. Leah Stewart, the first legally-recorded colored person in Gallia County, arrived in 1803. In this cemetery are the graves of numerous soldiers who served in this country’s military forces. At least 57 United States veterans rest upon this sacred site.