black and white photo of town with dirt road
This was the scene from downtown Fredericktown in the early 1900s.

History Knox

Mark Sebastian Jordan authors a column about Knox County history each Saturday at Knox Pages.

FREDERICKTOWN — Tim Ashcraft runs a great Facebook group, called Memories of Knox County, Ohio.

I wanted to share an excellent old postcard photo he posted to the group that shows downtown Fredericktown somewhere in the early 1900s.

Looking down the hill toward the mill, there is a prominent large building that group member James Wagner identified as the Odd Fellows Hall.

In addition, the sign for Simons Meat Market is clearly visible, as are a number of horses and buggies, tied up to hitching posts outside the shops.

I also find it interesting to note the presence of manhole covers in the street, set in concrete, even though it is still a dirt road.

That tells us that storm sewer infrastructure came before paving, which makes sense, considering the steepness of parts of the hill that Fredericktown sits upon.

Without a way to control storm runoff, the roads would have quickly eroded into gullies. The drains were probably an early feature of the town.

Meanwhile, in a follow up to last week’s column about Gambier wagonmaker Simon Colwill, reader Margo de Camp wrote in with further insight:

“I just want to let you know that a few of us feel that the picture you included with your article about the Wagon Maker is not the house which you showed on the map,” de Camp wrote.

“That house, which used to be owned by Richard Baer, has been torn down. It was way closer to 308 than the pictured house, almost to Depolo Road. And the curve is still in the road as it has to get around the spring.”

This means that the house placement in the 1871 atlas was the correct one, not the 1896 atlas.

Oh, well. It was a 50-50 chance, and I opted for the wrong one. This must be why I have yet to win the big lottery, I never win the odds!

But I’ll keep trying both to win and to get the details right.

For now, thanks for the correction, and onward we go!