Austintown Log House facts for kids
Quick facts for kids |
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Austintown Log House
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 Location in Ohio
Location in the United States
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| Nearest city | Youngstown, Ohio |
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| Built | 1814 |
| Architectural style | log cabin |
| NRHP reference No. | 74001566 |
| Added to NRHP | 1974-07-30 |
The Austintown Log House is a historic log cabin located near Youngstown, Ohio, in the United States. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on July 30, 1974. This special cabin is looked after by the Austintown Historical Society and is often called the "Austin Log Cabin." It's a great example of early American homes.
Discovering a Hidden Gem
How the Cabin Was Found
In 1973, a church called St. Andrew's Episcopal Church in Austintown Township, Ohio, bought an old house next to their property. They planned to tear it down. But as they started, they found something amazing! Underneath the outer layers of brick and siding, there were strong, log-like beams.
Work stopped right away. Volunteers carefully removed the modern coverings. What they found was a two-story log cabin! The way the logs were cut showed that the cabin was built before 1824. This was a very old and important discovery.
Who Owned the Land?
People then looked through old property records. They found that a man named Calvin Austin sold the land (about 150 acres) to John Packard on April 29, 1814, for $500. Calvin Austin was a land agent for the Connecticut Land Company. Austintown Township was even named after him! Everyone realized this old cabin was a true treasure that needed to be saved.
Life in the Log House
Early Families Living Here
The first people to live in the log house were John Harris Packard and his second wife, Mary Alfred Barnes Packard. John Harris Packard was born in Massachusetts in 1748. He, Mary, and their ten children moved to Austintown in 1814.
When John passed away in 1827, he left the log house and about 120 acres of land to his son, William Packard. Over the years, parts of the property were sold to different families. In 1828, William Packard sold 30 acres to Samuel Dorwat. Then, in 1829, Dorwat sold 10 acres, including the house, to Henry Lawrence and his wife Polly.
More Families and Changes
In 1845, Abraham Dustman and his wife, Rebecca Mauer Dustman, bought the 10 acres for $406. They lived there with their five children. Mr. Dustman was a farmer and is thought to have built a barn that was later destroyed in a fire in 1910.
In 1850, the Dustmans sold the property to Henry Wehr and his wife Margaret. Henry Wehr dug wells and added a hog shed. Later, his nephew, Levi Wehr, owned the house. An archaeologist found many old bottles hidden in the foundation of a barn Levi built in 1910. Levi and his wife, Emma, raised two daughters in the house.
In the 1940s, Willard Wesley Stricklin owned the house. He is said to have dug out a root cellar under the kitchen. From 1948 to 1963, Joseph Hanko lived there. He dug out a cellar under the main part of the house and added a small bathroom. The house was empty from 1964 until 1973, when the church bought it.
Saving the Austin Log Cabin
Community Effort to Restore
The Austintown Community Council and many local people worked together to raise money to fix up the cabin. They came up with a clever idea: they stood at the busiest intersection in Austintown and collected donations from drivers stopped at red lights!
This fundraising, along with pennies from school children, donations from parent-teacher groups, clubs, and churches, plus bake sales, book sales, and flea markets, helped them raise $50,000! This money was used to restore the cabin.
Bringing the Cabin Back to Life
While some volunteers were raising money, others were busy restoring the cabin. They worked with an architect who knew a lot about old buildings. They replaced the roof with a wood shake roof, removed inside walls, and put in new windows using glass panes from a 100-year-old schoolhouse. They also added a furnace and new plumbing.
To protect the logs, they sealed them with special materials. They also replaced the old "chinking" (the material between the logs) with a cement mixture that looked like the original clay, straw, mud, and rock. The fireplace was also restored using old bricks and a barn beam for the mantel.
Thanks to all their hard work, the Austin Log Cabin was named a National Historic Landmark in 1975. On July 4, 1976, the cabin was officially dedicated as Austintown's Bicentennial Project, celebrating 200 years of the United States.
The Austintown Historical Society
The Austintown Historical Society was formed on July 21, 1976, specifically to take care of the Austin Log Cabin. They are a non-profit organization that continues to maintain the cabin, pay for utilities, and handle daily upkeep.
The Cabin Today
What You Can See Inside
The Austintown Historical Society has filled the Austin Log Cabin with old furniture and items from the past. These include a bed once slept in by Frank Ohl, a spinning wheel, and old tables.
One room in the cabin is dedicated to the Bicentennial of the United States, showing items from that time. Another room upstairs looks like a one-room schoolhouse. It has documents and photos of Austintown's 12 original one-room schoolhouses, an old coal stove, desks, and old books. You can even see yearbooks from Austintown Fitch High School dating back to 1917!
The basement of the cabin displays antique farm tools. Outside, you can see a corn crib, an old outhouse, a smokehouse, and various farming tools. There's even a coal car from one of Austintown's first coal mines.
Archaeological Discoveries
The Austin Log Cabin has also been the site of an archaeological dig. Dr. John White, a professor from Youngstown State University, supervised this dig. Besides the cabin itself, Dr. White's team found evidence of other old structures. These included a shed used as a chicken coop, old wells, another chicken house, two outdoor toilets, and two barns. They also found a hog shed, a cistern, and a summer house.
Relics found during these digs are displayed throughout the cabin. Dr. White also wrote a book called "Archaeology of the Log House," which you can see there.
The cabin is open for free tours on the first Sunday of every month from March to December, between 1 PM and 3 PM. You can also arrange a visit by appointment at other times. It's a fantastic place to learn about history!
