Granville in Licking County, Ohio — The American Midwest (Great Lakes)

Granville's Welsh Hills

Photographed by Cosmos Mariner, September 12, 2022

1. Granville's Welsh Hills Marker

Inscription.
In 1801, a group of Welsh people living in Pennsylvania decided to move west in search of better farmland. They bought land in the area that now encompasses northeastern Granville Township and parts of the surrounding townships. At the time, they simply referred to the area as "the Hills." We now call it the Welsh Hills in honor of the settlers of the region.

The first to move to the Hills were Theophilus Rees and his extended family. In 1802 they occupied the 998 acres he purchased. Within a few years, Thomas Philipps and his extended family moved to the 799 acres he purchased. Other Welsh families moved to the area between 1803 and the 1880s.

The Welsh who lived in the Hills created their own schools and churches, farmed the land, raised sheep, and tended orchards. They had cooper shops and mills, and they harvested and burned trees to produce charcoal that was sold through the country. By the late 1830s, it was recorded there were 33 farms, 77 homes, and over 200 people living in the community of the Hills. Today many of the Welsh descendants still reside in the area.

Erected 2022 by Granville Historical Society;

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and Granville Community Foundation.

Topics. This historical marker is listed in these topic lists: Agriculture • Industry & Commerce • Settlements & Settlers. A significant historical year for this entry is 1801.

Location. 40° 4.06′ N, 82° 31.171′ W. Marker is in Granville, Ohio, in Licking County. It is at the intersection of East Broadway (Ohio Route 661) and Linden Place, on the right when traveling east on East Broadway. Marker is located in the garden courtyard directly in front of the Granville Historical Society Museum. Touch for map. Marker is at or near this postal address: 115 East Broadway, Granville OH 43023, United States of America. Touch for directions.

Regionally, this marker is in the Columbus Metropolitan Area.

It is also in the American Midwest,

in the Corn Belt,

in Appalachia,

and specifically in Northern Appalachia. Globally, it is in North America,

the Western Hemisphere,

the Western World,

and the Anglosphere.

Historically, it finds itself in what was once the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Confederacy,

the territory of the Mississippian Culture,

and the Northwest Territory.

Other nearby markers. At

Marker detail: Granville's Welsh Hills image. Click for full size.

2. Marker detail: Granville's Welsh Hills

1 • Philipps Cemetery
2 • Welsh Hills Baptist Church
3 • Welsh Hills School and Grange (razed)
4 • Welsh Calvinistic Methodist Church (razed)
5 • Old Stone School (razed)
6 • Welsh Hills Cemetery
7 • Site of first cabin — Theophilus Rees (razed)
8 • First brick house — Samuel J. Philipps

least 8 other markers are within walking distance of this marker: Bank of the Alexandrian Society (here, next to this marker); Granville's Earliest Residents (here, next to this marker); Granville's Broadway (a few steps from this marker); St. Luke's Episcopal Church (a few steps from this marker); Bolen Memorial Park (within shouting distance of this marker); Founding of Granville, The Licking Company / The Granville Site, "The most eligible part" (within shouting distance of this marker); Granville Opera House (within shouting distance of this marker); Gerald Bancroft House (about 300 feet away, measured in a direct line). Touch for a list and map of all markers in Granville.

Also see . . .
1. Establishment and Settlement of Granville.

Granville Township was surveyed in 1797 as part of the U.S. Military District. These were lands set aside for those who had served in the Revolutionary War. Land was acquired, according to an act of Congress in 1796, in units of 4,000 acres. The first to arrive were the Welsh, as 4,000 acres in the northeast quadrant of the township were sold to Sampson Davis, a Welshman living in Philadelphia.

3. Marker detail: Two Children on Hankinson Road, 1905
In 1801, he sold 1,800 of his acres to Thomas Philipps and Theophilus Rees, two men who left homes in Wales in 1795 and settled briefly in Philadelphia before moving to Beulah, in Cambria County, Pennsylvania (about eighty miles east of Pittsburgh). Prior to the earliest Welsh settlers arriving in the township in 1802, there were squatters on land, but the Welsh were the first settlers to own the deeds to the land that they occupied. This area of the township still bears the imprint of the early settlers by the Welsh names given to the roads – Jones Road, Welsh Hills Road.

(Submitted on September 21, 2022, by Cosmos Mariner of Cape Canaveral, Florida.)

2. Granville museum takes village’s history outdoors.

“Granville’s Welsh Hills” features a map of the area in northeast Granville Township settled by the newcomers from Wales, with drawings of significant buildings that once stood in the area. There are also photos of an early log farm home circa 1890 and another the last public spring, circa 1928.

(Submitted on September 21, 2022, by Cosmos Mariner of Cape Canaveral, Florida.)

Marker detail: Last Public Spring in Welsh Hills, ca. 1928 image. Click for full size.

4. Marker detail: Last Public Spring in Welsh Hills, ca. 1928

Marker detail: Early Log Farm Home in the Area image. Click for full size.

5. Marker detail: Early Log Farm Home in the Area

(after abandonment, ca. 1890)

Photographed by Cosmos Mariner, September 12, 2022

6. Granville's Welsh Hills Marker

(looking east • Granville Historical Society Museum at left edge)

Credits. This page was last revised on September 21, 2022. It was originally submitted on September 21, 2022, by Cosmos Mariner of Cape Canaveral, Florida. This page has been viewed 804 times since then and 87 times this year. Photos: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. submitted on September 21, 2022, by Cosmos Mariner of Cape Canaveral, Florida.