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10-73 Hillcrest Children’s Home
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 […]
9-73 Camp Oyo Boy Scout Camp
In 1926, Ohio Governor Alvin Donahey approved setting aside 55 acres of the Roosevelt Game Refuge for a Boy Scout camp. Since that time Camp Oyo has served Boy Scouts and other groups from Ohio and Kentucky. The name ‘Oyo’ is from an Iroquois word meaning “great water or principal river.” During the peak of […]
8-73 Portsmouth and The Ohio River
The Ohio River floodwaters account for Portsmouth’s settlement. Alexandria, the county’s first town, was laid out in 1799 on the west bank of the Scioto at its confluence with the Ohio. Early settlers in Alexandria were forced to higher ground across the river in Portsmouth because of frequent flooding. As a result, Portsmouth, platted in […]
7-73 Spartan Municipal Stadium
Opened in the fall of 1930, Universal Stadium became the home of the Portsmouth Spartans professional football team. Earlier that summer, the Spartans had just become a member of the National Football League (NFL). Led by a few local businessmen, the Portsmouth National Football League Corporation raised money to help build the permanent stadium for […]
6-73 Lucasville Cemetery / Captain John Lucas, Founder of Lucasville
Lucasville Cemetery was originally established as the Lucas Family burying ground, with Susannah Lucas as the first recorded burial on May 4, 1809. Susannah’s husband, Captain William Lucas, a Revolutionary War veteran, is interred here along with the first wife of Governor Robert Lucas, Eliza “Betsy” Brown Lucas. By 1816, the cemetery was used as […]
5-73 The Honorable Vern Riffe (1925-1997)
A native of New Boston, Vernal G. Riffe Jr. served the 92nd House District in the Ohio General Assembly from 1959 to 1994. As Speaker of the Ohio House of Representatives from 1974 through 1994, he served longer than any other speaker in the state’s history. Widely regarded as Ohio’s most influential legislator of the […]
4-73 Boyhood Home of Roy Rogers
One of the most influential icons of American popular culture in the mid-20th century, Roy Rogers was born Leonard Franklin Sly on November 5, 1911 in Cincinnati. He moved to this farm at age 8 from Portsmouth and lived here with his family until the Great Depression. He went to California in 1930, working as […]
3-73 Boyhood Home of Wesley Branch Rickey, Baseball Pioneer, Innovator, Executive
Branch Rickey, a pivotal figure in the history of baseball, was raised in this house with his brothers, Orla and Frank. Rickey started baseball’s farm team system while he was president, vice president, and manager of the St. Louis Cardinals from 1917-1942. As president of the Brooklyn Dodgers from 1942-1950, he signed Jackie Robinson to […]
2-73 Sciotoville Bridge
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 […]
1-73 Otway Bridge / Timber Covered Bridge
This bridge, spanning Brush Creek in Brush Creek Township, Scioto County, was erected in 1874 by the Smith Bridge Company of Toledo, Ohio. Robert W. Smith was granted patents for timber trusses in 1867 and 1869, and the design for this bridge is a Smith patented truss. The supplemental arches were added in 1896. Original […]