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In the years leading to Ohio statehood in 1803, Ames Township citizens decided to establish a stock-owned circulating library. Since cash was scarce during Ohio’s frontier era, some citizens paid for their $2.50 shares by the sale of animal pelts, which were taken to Boston for sale in the spring of 1804 by merchant Samuel Brown. There he acquired fifty-one volumes, primarily books on history, religion, travel, and biography, as the first accessions for the Western Library Association. Senator Thomas Ewing later related that he paid his share with ten raccoon skins, thus suggesting the collection’s popular name “the Coonskin Library.” Judge Ephraim Cutler was the first of many librarians who kept the library until 1861.
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Evansport is named after brothers Amos and Albert G. Evans who, with Jacob Coy, had the village surveyed next to the Tiffin River on December 14, 1835. The “port” suffix in Evansport’s name reflects the river’s significance as a transportation thoroughfare. Evansport’s early growth was spurred by its mills powered by the Tiffin River. The mills provided settlers with lumber for buildings and supplied flour and cornmeal for sustenance and commerce. Settlers who poured into Williams County’s northern townships in the 1830s agitated debate about moving the county seat to a more centralized location. Evansport was platted as a possible site for the county seat. The Williams County seat was moved to Bryan in 1840 and in 1845 Defiance County was created, leaving Evansport on the Williams-Defiance county line.
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Irish railroad workers founded the Catholic community in Washington Court House in the 1850s, with the first Mass being held in a local shanty in 1852. In 1871, Father John B. O’Donoghue purchased three and 5/8 acres of land adjoining Washington cemetery on the outskirts of Washington Court House to build the St. Colman Church and adjacent cemetery. In 1885, much of Washington Court House, including St. Colman Church, was destroyed by a tornado. To mark the site of the church, a stone monument was erected on June 19, 1916. Over thirty-five veterans from the Civil War, Spanish-American War, and World War I are buried in St. Colman Cemetery, and at least sixteen of these veterans were Irish immigrants. The cemetery’s highest decorated veteran, James Aloysius Ducey, served in World War I and World War II, earning numerous awards, including the Silver Star and the French Croix de Guerre.
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On this site in 1829 the Presbyterians of Blendon Township built their first church. The land was donated by Timothy Lee for “church and burial” purposes. The Reverend Ebenezer Washburn, buried here, was the first minister. The church was destroyed one week after its dedication by an apparent act of arson.
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The Methodist Episcopal Church pioneered organized religion in Perkins Township in 1811, then in Sandusky when the Rev. Alfred Brunson preached the city’s first sermon in January, 1818. In 1829 the Methodists built Sandusky’s first church, on West Square, and had later churches on the present sites of the Court House and Post Office. This building was begun in 1922, the sanctuary completed in 1958. The Perkins and Sandusky congregations united in 1930.
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The first home of the oldest Episcopal parish in the Connecticut Western Reserve, the St. James Episcopal Church was built between 1827 and 1828. Philander Chase, first Bishop of the Diocese of Ohio, consecrated it in 1829. The belfry and steeple were added in 1881. It was moved to this site from its original Market Street location in 1972 after the parish built a new church. Renamed the St. James Meeting House, it is the anchor of a community of historic buildings that includes the Beardsley-Walter-Diehm House (circa 1828), the Oswald Detchon House (circa 1840), and the Schiller-Chuey Summer Kitchen. The oldest known structure in Boardman, the St. James Meeting House was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.
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Many well-known hymns, including “Sweeter As the Years Go By,” “Nearer, Still Nearer,” and “Let Jesus Come Into Your Heart,” were composed in this church by its organist, Mrs. Lelia Morris (1862-1929). Her songs have been translated into many languages and published in the hymnals of Protestant denominations around the world. The Methodist Episcopal congregation of McConnelsville was formally established in 1826 and is the town’s oldest denomination. The present church was completed in 1860. It replaced a stone building constructed in 1836. General Robert McConnel, the founder of McConnelsville, donated this land for the use of the Methodists in 1817.
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Samuel Patterson arrived in East Orange in 1824 and, within a few years, began to hide runaway slaves in his home. He also invited anti-slavery speakers to the pulpit of the East Orange Methodist Church, which brought Patterson and his neighbors into conflict with the bishop. Following their consciences, they became Wesleyan Methodists and built a new church. A pro-slavery neighbor mocked them by calling their community Africa, and so East Orange was renamed. The village has disappeared, but several homes owned by Patterson and his neighbors still stand in this vicinity.
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