West Columbus

By Sean V. Lehosit

Present-day West Columbus is a collective of neighborhoods born from the western banks of the Scioto River in what became Franklin County on April 30, 1803. The first settlement, Franklinton, was founded by Lucas Sullivant in 1797, platted two years after he received 6,000 acres in payment for surveying the central Ohio portion of the Virginia Military District. Later expansions included the areas of Sullivant's Hill, Rome, and Camp Chase. While the first settlers were farmers and ex-soldiers, the land would also attract Quakers, rail men, real estate moguls, and manufacturers. The neighborhoods found success even though the Scioto River, which birthed the region, on multiple occasions threatened to wash them off the map during three great floods. Characterized by a hardworking and driven population, the community attracted major investments by the mid-1900s, including the expanded operations of the General Motors Fisher Body Plant.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
• Release date: Sep 28, 2015
• ISBN: 9781439653364

Sean V. Lehosit

Sean V. Lehosit is a freelance journalist who grew up on "the Hilltop" and a graduate of The Ohio State University. He has combed through the extensive historical records and photographs of the Columbus Metropolitan Library, Grandview Heights Public Library, and the nostalgic artifacts from residents to best capture the early lives of the region's pocket neighborhoods.

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INTRODUCTION

Following the Revolutionary War, approximately 4.2 million acres of land was labeled the Virginia Military District and used to pay Virginian officers for their services. So, in the late 1790s, many officers hired surveyors to scope the land bordered by the Ohio River to the south, Little Miami River to the west, and the Scioto River to the east and north.

In 1795, the Commonwealth of Virginia hired Lucas Sullivant to lead a survey team of assistants, scouts, and hunters into the northern part of the Virginia Military District, which would bring them to the banks of the Scioto River.

It was common for surveyors to be paid in land, so Sullivant kept an eye out for potential community spots he liked; the one that seemed the most promising was land just west of the Scioto River. With the 6,000 acres he received as payment, he created Franklinton as the first settlement in Central Ohio. It was named after Benjamin Franklin, who he admired greatly and had recently passed.

Over the next few decades, other settlements began to emerge nearby. While Lucas chose to remain in Franklinton, his sons Michael and William Starling bought land from him west of his settlement and above the river level. This new area for farming was called Sullivant’s Hill, and Franklinton became lovingly referred to as the Bottoms.

Present-day West Columbus was touched by two military conflicts during its formative years. Franklinton was used as a staging point for William Henry Harrison and his men during the War of 1812. Then, during the Civil War, the Union leased land on Sullivant’s Hill to establish a volunteer regiment training camp, Camp Chase. The site was converted into a Confederate prison and cemetery, which remains one of the most noteworthy historical attractions in the region.

The abandonment of Camp Chase rose opportunity for Quaker settlers to invest in the farmlands. It could be said these religious folk are one of the reasons faith remained an important pillar in the lives of many West Columbus residents. Churches were an important part of everyday life and the venues for a lot of social events in the early 1900s.

In 1812, the City of Columbus was founded on the opposite Franklinton at the Scioto River. Most of the settlements in the county fell within the borders of Franklin Township, which covered the most territory out of any other township. Columbus was aggressive with its annexation, though, and began to absorb one community after another in 1859.

In 1863, Columbus owned 1,100 acres of land. It annexed an additional 2,740 acres of land from Franklin Township over the next 10 years. The city would continue this practice over the next 100 years and spread its territory in all directions—north, south, east and west.

The western region, known as West Columbus, became a collective of neighborhoods that weaved together uniformly due to the heavy land use of farming over the better portion of a century.

West Columbus begins with the Franklinton area and continued to annex acreage and grow so it is bordered by West Jefferson to the west, Hilliard to the north, and Grove City to the south. Other unincorporated villages or townships are small enclaves that are absorbed more by West Columbus every year.

The largest area within West Columbus is the Hilltop, which is broken down into subdivisions. Many of the early subdivisions were named after early settlers or influential politicians like the area of Briggsdale, Franklinton, or Camp Chase, which all still exists. Other neighborhoods were created by realty investors and products of the streetcar system era, like Westgate.

Flooding could have smothered out the region, and it almost did the first year Sullivant settled in Franklinton. However, the early settlers were hardworking farm laborers and persevered. The railroad industry transformed them from a rural region into an industrial one. The stable work and the introduction of streetcars swelled the population, so it could sustain a transition to commercial retail in the 1920s.

The main two commercial corridors were Broad Street and Sullivant Avenue. Both roads became lined with family businesses and prosperity through the 1940s, when following World War II, the Fisher Body Plant was built at the western outskirts of the Hilltop, at West Broad Street and Georgesville Road. Once again, West Columbus was happy to transition.

More and more automobile-oriented businesses opened up on the Hilltop, and the car manufacturer employed many residents. The company performed well in profits during wartime, and demand was higher than ever. Even in Franklinton, the family-owned A.D. Farrow arrived in 1941 and remained there to become the oldest Harley-Davidson dealership in the United States today.

Commerce was doing so well, a group of businessmen got together and formed the Hilltop Business Association. The organization created a support structure to aid, promote, and further commercial efforts in the neighborhoods. It also started the annual Bean Dinner, which weaved together the communities’ past and present histories every summer at Westgate Park. Politicians could come out to introduce themselves to residents, businesses could hawk their items, organizations could recruit new members, and it was also chance for residents and churches to come out and socialize. The event began to see as many as 10,000 visitors each year, with outside people even coming in to watch the parade and enjoy cornbread and beans.

Life was great for residents of West Columbus by 1950. There was a healthy and expanding environment for family enterprises and plenty of stable and good-paying work, and the town’s favorite baseball team, the Columbus Red Birds, had won the Junior World Series a total of six times since construction of the new stadium in Franklinton.

The future of West Columbus became economically grim a few decades from this point, and it could very well be that the community became a victim of its own growth and success. The region later struggled as factories closed, baseball moved away, and with less money to spend, the retail corridors dried up. However, just as the people did not let the flooding waters of Scioto River drown them, people today are finding ways to rebuild.

One

THE EARLY SETTLERS

SETTING THE STAGE

FOR WEST COLUMBUS

When surveyor Lucas Sullivant founded the Franklinton area, named after Benjamin Franklin,