"The Society is starting the process of revising its best seller, A Sense of Place." 

It was originally published in 1977, with a second printing in 1985.

Martha Boice headed the five year project that produced A Sense of Place in 1977.  The community was losing its houses, significant houses like the McEwen house, and it was difficult to bear.  Some one-hundred historic buildings were still being used and an effort needed to be made to provide information on each one for zoning meetings and to homeowners, so that all would appreciate the historic homes in our community.  Martha trained a group of motivated volunteers to look up deeds and tax reports to document the buildings, and to record the chain of ownership.  Twenty volunteers worked on this publication.

The members of the Landmark Committee that were the authors of the book were; Martha H. Boice, Chairman, Marjorie Clawson, Celia H. Elliott, Denise C. Hedley, Terrence McConville, and Linda J. Meinhardt.  The editor, Howard R. Houser, put all of their research together and produced a book that is full of information not only of our community, but of the details of the architecture that was used by the masons and carpenters of the time.

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Washington Township was one of the first four townships created in Montgomery County as this portion of the Northwest Territory became the State of Ohio.

City of Centerville sits on the highest point of the divide between the Little and Great Miami Rivers.

Together, they make up the community in which we live. The buildings in the town and township offer us a "meaningful history," one which we can "reach out and touch."  Nearly 100 houses, schools, commercial buildings, and one stone barn have been detailed in this book.

 

Contents

1. Acknowledgements

2. Preface

3. Historical Notes: The First Inhabitants - The Northwest Ordinance - John Cleves Symmes - The First Settlers - The First Homesteads - The Early Architecture

4. Washington Township Roads: Their Development in the Early 1800s

5. Centerville: The Four Corners - The Nutt Plat - The Robbins Plat

6. Washington Township - The Northeast Quadrant: The Presbyterian Settlement - The Quarrying Industry

7. Washington Township - The Northwest Quadrant: Woodbourne - The Farming Community - The Early Mills and Their Importance

8. Washington Township - The Southwest Quadrant: The Yankee Settlement - The Dayton-Lebanon Pike - Sheehan Road

9. Washington Township - The Southeast Quadrant: The Quakers - Stringtown - The Mills Along the Sugar Creek

10. Appendix

 

 

The Society’s job is local history.  Our “mission statement” commits us to collect it, preserve it, and tell the community about it.  We know a lot of what came before us, how we got here and why.  Much of that is due to the dedication and hard work of society members and friends and their research that produced many significant publications.

 

A Sense of Place and A Sense of Community make a good team.

A Sense of Community was written by a talented committee of authors as a keepsake for the Centerville-Washington Township Bicentennial 1996. It tells the fascinating story of the development and progress of our community through the people and the events of the last two hundred years.

A Sense of Place is also full of the history of our area, telling the story through the early homes and the people that lived in them.