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Edward Drummond Libbey High School . Edward Drummond Libbey High School – “the castle on the hill” – opened in 1923 to serve the growing number of students in Toledo Public Schools. The school offered a curriculum of manual and academic training, reflecting a progressive movement during the late 19th and early 20th centuries to democratize education. Libbey High School was named for Edward D. Libbey (1854-1925), a local businessman, civic leader, and philanthropist who founded the Libbey Glass Company and Toledo Museum of Art. Libbey’s successful business ventures earned Toledo the nickname “The Glass Capital of the World.” Much of his fortune was spent on providing cultural and educational institutions that still serve the public as of 2018. (Continued on other side)
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Willys-Overland Finishing Plant. Since 2004, the building at 14th and Adams Streets has been the home of the Toledo School for the Arts. The Willys-Overland Corporation erected the building c. 1916 to finish, ship, and sell the company’s cars. The popular Whippet and other models were delivered here to a second story loading dock from the Willys plant along what became Jeep Parkway. Vehicles were displayed behind floor-to-ceiling windows in a first floor showroom. The firm of Mills, Rhines, Bellman, and Nordoff designed the building and others in Toledo during the first third of the 20th century. In 1908, John North Willys (1873-1935) consolidated his company’s automobile production in Toledo. By 1912, Willys-Overland sales were second only to the Ford Motor Company’s. The company’s most famous product is the Jeep, which transported Allied service members from WWII to the 1980s and was a precursor to the sports utility vehicle.
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To utilize the area’s rich timber stands, Detroit industrialist Eber Brock Ward (1811-1875) built a canal around 1870 in what was then Oregon Township, Lucas County. Known as Ward’s Canal, it stretched approximately 2-3/4 miles through wetlands to Lake Erie. Through the canal passed timber sawn at Ward’s mills and ships from his boatyards. Two settlements formed to house workers: Shepherdsville, renamed Bono in 1898, and New Jerusalem. (Continued on other side)
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The Rotary Club of Toledo founded the “Toledo Society for Crippled Children” in 1920 to care for and treat children with disabilities, primarily those with polio. After a decade of fundraising and a substantial bequest from Edward Drummond Libbey, the Society opened a convalescent home in 1931 and moved to its own state-of-the-art facility in 1938. As the 1950s Salk vaccine reduced the prevalence of polio and the needs of Toledo’s disabled changed, the Society shifted focus to offer preschool care, adult rehabilitation, and independent living. The Society relocated to the 17-acre Monroe Street Campus in 1980 and adopted the name “The Ability Center of Greater Toledo” in 1990. The Ability Center proudly celebrated 100 years of “service above self” in 2020 and continues to create a disability-friendly Toledo.
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In 1915, real estate developers William B. Welles and Badger C. Bowen formed the Ottawa Park Realty Company and in 1917 platted 323 residential lots near Toledo, Ohio. Named “Westmoreland” for the similarities with the rolling landscapes of Westmoreland County, Virginia, the neighborhood was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1986. Westmoreland features 215 original homes, most representing architectural Revival styles of the early 20th century including those of the Colonial, Jacobethan/Tudor, Italianate, French, and Spanish Revivals. This marker commemorates the centennial of the founding of Westmoreland. (Continued on other side)
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