Description: Map of the Ohio Companys Purchase. The purchase contract was for approximately 1,500,000 acres along the Ohio River in south eastern Ohio. One section was to be set aside for public schools, one section for religious purposes and two townships were to be used for a university. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL07516
Subjects: Ohio Company (1786-1795); Maps--Ohio; Land settlement--Ohio
Places: Ohio
 

Description: 1804 map of Ohio engraving signed: "Drawn by S. Lewis, Engraved by A. [illegible]." Samuel Lewis of Philadelphia was a famous American geographer and cartographer and an extremely important figure in early American map-making who learned his trade from the prominent English cartographer Aaron Arrowsmith. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL07758
Subjects: Maps--Ohio; Ohio History; Engravings (prints); Land settlement--Ohio; Geography and Natural Resources
 

Description: Illustration of French expedition led by Joseph Pierre Celoron de Bienville, here depicted burying a lead plate. On these plates were pronouncements laying claim to the Ohio Country in the name of the king of France. At the places where major rivers joined the Ohio, the party stopped and buried one of the tablets. On a nearby tree, a metal plaque was placed, asserting the claims of France and stating that the tablet lay nearby. This practice of burying plates first began in Europe in the Middle Ages and was a common way to show landownership. In total, De Bienville is believed to have buried six plates. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL04622
Subjects: Ohio History--Settlement and Early Statehood; Ohio--History; Land settlement--Ohio; Explorers;
 

Description: Photograph of the Ohio Company Land Office taken between 1935-1943. The Campus Martius Museum highlights migration in Ohio's history. The museum is on the site of the fortification built by the Ohio Company of Associates, as their headquarters, in 1788 when they founded the first organized American settlement in the Northwest Territory. The restored Rufus Putnam house, part of the original fort, is now enclosed within a wing of the museum. Behind the museum is the Ohio Company's Land Office. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B15F01_069
Subjects: Marietta (Ohio); Campus Martius (Marietta, Ohio); Ohio Company; Land settlement--Ohio; Historical museums--Ohio
Places: Marietta (Ohio); Washington County (Ohio)
 

Description: Drawing depicting a clearing in the forest with a person leaning against a tree. Behind him is a small home with a thatched roof. The illustration is titled "The Emigrant," and comes from "The New Monthly Family Magazine: A Miscellany of Moral and Religious Instruction" (Volume 5, 1884). View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL07053
Subjects: Ohio History--Settlement and Early Statehood; Land settlement--Ohio
Places: Ohio
 

Description: This allegorical illustration depicts the imminent, irrevocable transformation of Ohio‘s physical and cultural landscape. Rifle in hand, a lone American Indian man kneels underneath a sheltering tree as he peers into a future that includes settlers, mechanized transportation, manufacturing, and the rise of cities. Together with a verse by John James Piatt, the illustration appears on the first page of the introduction to “The Biographical Cyclopedia and Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Men, with an Historical Sketch, of the State of Ohio, Vol. 1,” edited by J. Fletcher Brennan (Cincinnati: John C. Yorston & Company, 1880). The image is inscribed with the name of the engraving firm, Andrew & Filmer, and the section title, “Introduction.” View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL04491
Subjects: American Indians in Ohio; Ohio History--Settlement and Early Statehood; Piatt, John James, 1835-1917; Land settlement--Ohio
Places: Northwest Territory; Ohio
 

Description: Reproduction of a portrait of John Cleves Symmes. Symmes was a political leader in both New Jersey and Ohio, a land developer, and a businessman. During the 1780s, Symmes became interested in the Ohio Country. In 1794, President Washington approved a land patent for Symmes and some of his associates to purchase land between the Great and Little Miami Rivers. This was known as the Symmes or Miami Purchase. Text below the image reads "John Cleves Symmes (1742-1814, North Bend) The pioneer land proprietor between the Miamis." View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL02895
Subjects: Symmes, John Cleves, 1742-1814; Miami Purchase; Land settlement--Ohio; Ohio History
Places: North Bend (Ohio); Hamilton County (Ohio)
 

Description: The tomb of John Cleves Symmes (1742-1814). Symmes would come to be a prominent figure in the history of the early United States. He served some time in Congress and was also at one time a judge for the state of New Jersey. Symmes would eventually decide that it would be a good idea to start a settlement in what is today Ohio, pooling money together with others to acquire land out in the rugged frontier. Despite his good investment, there were glaring issues that soon cropped up and caused him trouble. Because of his disregard for policies about land ownership, there were cases where many people paid Symmes for land he didn't even own, which became a disaster for these settlers. Because of this disaster, private owners were no longer able to buy up land and then sell it. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL06776
Subjects: Symmes, John Cleves, 1742-1814; Northwest Territory--History; Northwest Territory--Politics and government; Land settlement--Ohio
Places: Northwest Territory; North Bend (Ohio); Hamilton County (Ohio)
 

Description: James C. Reynolds was the founder and namesake of the city of Reynoldsburg in central Ohio. Born in 1806, he arrived in the area which would become Reynoldsburg around 1831. After founding the city along the heavily-traveled Cumberland Road (also known as National Road), he served as a Brigadier General in the Ohio Militia and was a representative in the Ohio General Assembly. He died in 1854. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL04074
Subjects: Land settlement--Ohio; Cities and towns--Ohio; National Road
Places: Reynoldsburg (Ohio); Fairfield County (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio); Licking County (Ohio)
 

Description: This image shows John Johnston's estate in Piqua, Ohio. John Johnston (also spelled Johnson) was an Indian Agent in Ohio in the early years of the new state. He was born in 1775 in Ireland. While he was a young child, his family moved to Pennsylvania. Johnston participated in Anthony Wayne's assault on American Indians living in the Northwest Territory during the early 1790s. President James Madison selected Johnston as the Indian Agent overseeing the native reservations in northwestern Ohio. He served in this position for more than thirty years until the 1840s. His office was located in Piqua. Johnston played an important political and social role in Ohio as well. He was a strong advocate of the Whig Party. He helped found Kenyon College and also served on the board of trustees of Miami University. Johnston also published one of the earliest histories of the American Indians that once called Ohio home. He died in 1861 in Washington, DC. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL06522
Subjects: American Indian history and society; Land settlement--Ohio; American Indian agents
Places: Piqua (Ohio); Miami County (Ohio)
 

Description: Completed in 1805 by Zachariah DeWitt, this two-story log homestead is the oldest building in Oxford Township and one of the oldest remaining log structures in Ohio. Located on Miami University land and listed in the National Register of Historic Places, it has been under the care of the Oxford Museum Association since 1973. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL07520
Subjects: National Register of Historic Places; Land settlement--Ohio; Log cabins;
Places: Oxford (Ohio); Butler County (Ohio)
 

Description: This Vernier surveyor's compass which measures 14" by 7" (36 by 18 cm) was used by Joel Wright to plat the city of Columbus prior to its founding in 1812. The typical 19th-century brass and wooden compass was made in Winchester, Virginia. Joel Wright (1750-1829) was a Quaker born in Menallen, Pennsylvania, who first came to Ohio in 1788 as part of a team to survey the Northwest Territory. He surveyed the Muskingum, Scioto, and Great Miami valleys, and eventually settled in Ohio in 1806 in an area near present-day Waynesville. While a resident of Ohio, Wright platted the towns of Columbus, Dayton, and Springboro, Ohio, and Louisville, Kentucky. He was also the first surveyor of Warren County. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: Om1487_1535360_001
Subjects: Land settlement--Ohio; Geography and Natural Resources; Surveying; Surveying equipment
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)