Description: Photograph of the Unionville Tavern, also known as the Old Tavern, in Unionville, Ohio. The oldest surviving tavern in Ohio, the Unionville Tavern began as a log cabin in 1798. Over the years, the tavern expanded, providing fine accommodations and food for travelers in northeastern Ohio. Among the tavern's more famous guests were Thomas Edison and Henry Ford. During the early 1800s, it served as a stop for stagecoaches traveling between Buffalo, New York, and Cleveland, Ohio. During the 1840s and 1850s, the tavern's owners also provided a safe haven for runaway slaves traveling along the Underground Railroad. An Ohio Historical Marker, erected at the tavern in 2001, reads "First known as the Webster House, later as the New England House, and more recently as the Old Tavern, this inn has served travelers on the old Cleveland-Buffalo Road (now State Route 84) since before Ohio became a state. As traffic on the old Indian trail increased and it became a post and stage road, the two original log cabins, built in 1798 and later, were converted to this two-and-a-half story inn between 1815 and 1820. While the tavern was the scene of Civil War-era parties and dances in the second-floor ballroom, local tradition suggests it offered much more clandestine hospitality to escaping slaves as a station on the Underground Railroad. The Unionville Tavern was added to the National Register of Historical Places in 1973." View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B01F06_019
Subjects: Architecture; Hotels; Underground Railroad--Ohio; National Register of Historical Places
Places: Unionville (Ohio); Ashtabula County (Ohio); Lake County (Ohio)
 

Description: Taken by photographer Ihna Thayer Frary in 1922, this photograph shows the door of the Warner house in Unionville, Ohio. To either side of the door, two Ionic columns support a lintel decorated with acanthus scrolls and draped cloth. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1873, Ihna Thayer Frary was a prominent American art and architecture scholar, whose primary interest was the architectural heritage of the region of northeastern Ohio known as the Western Reserve. In addition to serving as publicity and membership secretary of the Cleveland Museum of Art, he was a professor of Ohio and American architecture at the Cleveland Institute of Art and Western Reserve University’s School of Architecture. Over the course of his career, Frary was a design consultant for private clients and designed furniture, and was an active member of several prominent arts councils in the Cleveland area. In 1963, Frary and his two sons donated his entire photographic collection to the Ohio Historical Society (now the Ohio History Connection). The Ihna Thayer Frary Collection consists of 4,000 5 x 7 photographs of private residences, churches, taverns, and public buildings, as well as select rural buildings, bridges, archaeological sites, and public monuments. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: P_112_B54A_1417_01
Subjects: Frary, I. T. (Ihna Thayer); Photography--Ohio; Western Reserve; Houses; Domestic architecture; Columns (architectural elements)
Places: Unionville (Ohio); Ashtabula County (Ohio); Columbiana County (Ohio); Holmes County (Ohio)
 

Description: Charles Warren Fairbanks (1852-1918), served as Vice President of the United States from 1905 to 1909 under President Theodore Roosevelt. Fairbanks was born on a farm near Unionville Center, Ohio. He graduated from Ohio Wesleyan University with a bachelor of arts and worked with the Associated Press in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and Cleveland, Ohio. He later studied law and worked for many railroad companies. Before he was Theodore Roosevelt's vice president, he was a member of the Senate from 1896 to 1905. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL04064
Subjects: Vice-Presidential candidates--United States; Ohio History--Presidents and Politics; Ohio Wesleyan University; Portrait photography
 

Description: Map of Union County, Ohio, from surveys by Andrew S. Mowry, published in 1870 by F.W. Beers & Co. of New York. This map shows land ownership within the county, and includes a table of distances and population chart for Union County in 1870. It also includes a view of the Courthouse in Marysville, Ohio, as well as insets of Irwin Station, Watkins, Pleasant Valley, Richwood, Marysville, Milford, Newton, Raymonds P.O., Essex, New California, Frankfort, Pharisburg, Broadway, New Dover, York Centre, Pottersburg P.O., Somersville and Unionville. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: MAPVFM347_2_01_Union_Co
Subjects: Maps--Ohio; Surveying; Union County (Ohio);
Places: Union County (Ohio)