Walking Tour of Oxford's University Historic District
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Pieces of Oxford’s Past Walking Tour of Oxford’s Oxford’s location was determined in the By 1856 the village was the home of five in- early 1800s when a site was selected for stitutions of higher learning. Miami Univer- Ohio’s second public university. To end sity, the Oxford Theological Seminary, the the squabbling among competing towns Oxford Female Institute, the Western Female University and cities, the decision was made to locate Seminary, and the Oxford Female College Miami University in an almost uninhabited made Oxford a true college town much like wilderness area that would be given the the city in England for which it was named. classic name Oxford. Historic In the following years Oxonians witnessed many changes in their small town. The For many years before, indigenous tribes in- Theological Seminary moved to Monmouth, cluding the Miami and Shawnee had shared Illinois, and Miami students left to fight on the rolling hills of southwestern Ohio. Af- both sides of the Civil War. The Female Insti- District ter their defeat by the army of General tute and Female College merged into what Anthony Wayne they were banished from would become Oxford College for Women. the region by the Treaty of Greenville in Miami University closed for twelve years, 1795. By 1809 when Miami University was and the Female Seminary became the West- chartered, descendants of European immi- ern College for Women. In 1971 Oxford be- grants had begun to settle along the Four came a city, and by the end of the twentieth Mile Creek (called Tallawanda by the Native century the remaining women’s schools had Americans). closed, leaving only Miami University. Some of Oxford’s best examples of nine- In 1810 settlers bought lots in the new vil- teenth- and early twentieth-century resi- lage that was laid out in a tract still referred dential architecture are concentrated in the to as the Mile Square. Both the village and University Historic District. Of these, some the university grew over the next two de- replaced earlier houses, and others were the cades, and in 1830 (with a population of first ones on their sites. Brief descriptions of over 700) Oxford was incorporated. The their significance are given, with additional new university’s campus was situated at information available from tour escorts and the eastern edge of what would become from the public library. the Uptown business district, and people who could afford a prime location began building houses with a view overlooking the University Square. Walking Tour of UNIVERSITY HISTORIC DISTRICT Oxford’s UNIVERSITY HISTORIC To arrange escorted group tours contact the 7 Oxford Visitors & Convention Bureau 8 DISTRICT 14 West Park Place, Suite C Oxford, OH 45056 Designated by the City of Oxford in Phone 513-523-8687 13 12 11 10 9 6 5 4 3 2 1 1979, the University Historic District is Fax 513-523-2927 Ave. University Bishop Street Rd. Tallawanda one of the city’s three historic districts E-mail [email protected] High Street and the only one that was originally Website www.enjoyoxford.org comprised almost entirely of residential 14 architecture. The U-shaped district of For additional information on Oxford history 15 nine blocks on East High Street, South contact the Lane Public Libraries’ Campus Avenue, and East Spring Street, 16 nearly surrounds the original University Smith Library of Regional History 15 South College Avenue 17 Square. This self-guided tour includes Oxford, OH 45056 brief descriptions of the history and ar- Phone 513-523-3035 Walnut St. chitecture of the first or most significant Fax 513-523-6661 building on each of 33 sites. An illustra- E-mail [email protected] 18 Website www.lanepl.org/smith.html tion is included for each, although the 19 quality of surviving photographs var- University ies. In order to provide a more compre- Photographs were taken by Miami Univer- 20 Irvin Drive hensive view of the neighborhoods of sity Recensio staff, Frank R. Snyder, Gilson P. Square some of Oxford’s most prominent early Wright, Stephen C. Gordon, and others whose 21 citizens, pictures and information on names are not known. The only drawing is by Herbert Oerter. These images date from the Collins St. dwellings are included even if the hous- Campus Avenue early the 1900s and are part of the Smith Li- 22 es themselves have not survived into brary collection. the twenty-first century. 23 Most of the research was conducted by a vol- HOW TO USE THIS GUIDE unteer, and the text was written by staff of the Smith Library of Regional History. Printing 24 was under the direction of the Oxford Visitors To take the walking tour, begin at the & Convention Bureau with financial assistance 25 parking lot on the northwest corner of from the W. E. Smith Family Charitable Trust. East High Street and Tallawanda Road. Spring Street The circled number next to each address Cover: The photograph was taken by Robert E. White in 1975. It shows the west side of 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 in the booklet corresponds to a location South Campus Avenue between Walnut and on the foldout map in the back. The tour Collins Streets. takes about one hour. Oxford, Ohio 2008 Oak Street 1 412 East High Street A parking lot today was once the site of the Tallawanda Apartments, a building no longer visible, but which figured in the history of Ox- ford and Miami University. Privately built by Miami faculty in 1908 after an earlier dwelling was moved from the site, the three-storey, dark red brick building originally included a commu- nal dining room for its residents. In 1929 a res- taurant called “Tuffy’s” opened in the basement and served its famous toasted rolls for almost half a century. Miami leased the building for both student and faculty housing before pur- chasing the property in 1952 for long-term use as a women’s residence hall. A good example of Second Renaissance Revival style, it was de- signed by Cincinnati architect Joseph Steinkamp and was razed by Miami in 1984. Miami Recensio, 1935 2 410 East High Street This small, painted brick house with Greek Revival elements was built in 1852 by Samuel R. and Elizabeth (Gage) Mollyneaux. A native of Ireland, Mollyneaux was a businessman who served one year as mayor of Oxford. The house later became known as the Old Manse because it served as the Presbyterian Church parsonage from 1883 to 1956. During that time, ministers’ families lived within five blocks of their church on the northeast corner of Main and Church Streets. Among these were the Thomas Porter family, several of whose children were born in Persia or Brazil and later the William Frazer, Ru- dolph Riemann, and Eliot Porter families. Nick- named the “Coffee Mill House” because of its shape (with a widow’s walk on the roof), it later housed Westminster Foundation and since 1974, the offices of Miami’s Department of Compara- tive Religion. Oxford Citizen, April 27, 1867 3 400 East High Street Bishop House once stood on the site now occupied by an early 1960s residence that faces a side street. From 1836 to 1845, it was the home of Miami’s first president, Robert Hamilton Bish- op and his wife, Anne (Ireland), both natives of Scotland. Originally built as a one-storey house by their eldest son in 1834, it was later the home of a younger son, Robert H. Bishop, Jr., profes- sor of Latin, and his wife, Eliza (Lyons), who en- larged the residence with a second storey to ac- commodate their large family. Just prior to the Civil War, the household included Mary Henry, a 17-year-old African-American servant. The frame dwelling with Gothic trim was the site of Miami’s alumni gatherings until 1889. The prop- erty remained in the Bishop family until 1929 when it was acquired by Miami for eventual use as office space by the School of Fine Arts. In its last years, it was used by the University’s De- partment of Music before being razed in 1960. Oxford Chronicle, March 22, 1834 4 322 East High Street A landscaped lot today was once the site of the Kennedy House, which was probably con- structed in the 1840s. By 1850, the two-storey, frame dwelling was occupied by civil engineer William Kennedy and his Scottish-born wife Lallias (Brough), who resided here for three de- cades. Living with the Kennedy family before the Civil War was a teenaged African-American servant named Mary Clay. The house was later occupied by a harness maker, and in the early years of the twentieth century by a minister and his family and then by a divorcee and her children. It was used as a lodging house during and after World War I before becoming a sin- gle-family home again where professors in the fields of education, music, English, and geogra- phy resided for most of the next fifty years. It was purchased by Miami about a decade before it was destroyed by arson in 1978. Oxford News, January 22, 1897 5 310 East High Street Lewis Place was built in 1839 by Romeo and Jane (North) Lewis. The painted brick house in the Greek Revival style included features com- mon in the South because Romeo had lived in Florida. Jane, a native of Connecticut, is said to have operated an Underground Railroad stop in the home after her husband’s death in 1843. So often did she take in relatives who were invalids, widows, and orphans, that her home was some- times called “Saint’s Rest.” For a period after the Civil War the household also included Irish and African-American live-in servants.