Description: Colonel George Newcom, one of Dayton's first settlers, constructed this two-story log house in 1796. Newcom engaged Robert Edgar, a millwright, to build "the best house in Dayton." The original house consisted of one room upstairs and one room on the ground floor, with a door facing the river. In 1798, a two-story addition was added south of the original structure, with a new door facing Main Street. George Newcom was a veteran of General Anthony Wayne's campaign against the Indians and led one of three groups of original settlers that headed north from Cincinnati to Dayton in 1796. He and his wife, the former Mary Henderson, chose lot #13 on which to build their new home. In 1800, Mary gave birth to one of the first white children born in Dayton, their daughter Jane. Since the tavern was a large two-story building, it soon became the center of village activity, as well as overnight lodging for travelers. The first court sessions were held in the tavern, and it served as a place for school and church services. During this period George Newcom became a prominent civic leader, serving as Dayton's first innkeeper, and Montgomery County's first sheriff and jailer. He was elected to the Ohio Senate in 1815, succeeded Benjamin Van Cleve in the office of clerk of the court, and became president of Dayton's first bank. The Newcoms sold the tavern in 1815, and ownership changed several times during the next twenty years. In 1838, Joseph Shaffer purchased the structure at a Sheriff's auction and converted it into a general store. The building remained "Shaffer's Store" for the next 56 years. In 1894, architect Charles Insco Williams started to raze it to make way for an apartment building when removal of the clapboards revealed the original logs. John Cotterill owned the building and offered to donate it to the city, provided it was moved off the property. Acting on the recommendations of the "Log Cabin Committee, " the city approved moving the tavern to Van Cleve Park. John H. Patterson, founder of The National Cash Register Company, paid for the move. The Daughters of the American Revolution raised money by public subscription to have it restored, and the Dayton Historical Society was organized to operate it as a museum. In the 1960s, the Montgomery Historical Society donated the tavern and related collections to Carillon Historical Park. Newcom Tavern made its final move in the fall of 1964. Today, now Dayton's oldest standing building, Newcom Tavern stands in Carillon Historical Park, approximately two miles south of its original site. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B01F11_008
Subjects: Taverns (Inns)--Ohio; Log-end Architecture, Domestic--Ohio--Pictorial works.; Architecture, Domestic--Ohio--Pictorial works.; Architecture--Ohio; Dayton (Ohio)--Buildings, structures, etc.--Pictorial works; Patterson, Robert, 1753-1827; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Dayton (Ohio); Montgomery County (Ohio)