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Consider restoration of historic home

DEAR EDITOR:

Just imagine what the walls at 410 Mahoning Ave., the house next to the Warren Trumbull County Public Library, has heard.

The Boston architect came to Warren about 1840 at the request of Simon Perkins. The house has been visited by well-known names since then.

One of the first residents was the Rev. Joseph Marvin family.

Marvin was brother of Phebe Marvin Sutliff and uncle to Phebe Temperance Sutliff. Levi Sutliff, Marvin’s brother-in-law, was a founder of the anti-slavery movement and involved in the Underground Railroad. Maybe the home was even involved in the Underground Railroad.

Mrs. Marvin was Lucy Dana, cousin to the Danas that founded Dana School of Music. Imagine the music within those walls. Their daughter, Lucy, married Fredrick Kinsman, who grew up in what we know as the Kinsman house. The next occupant was Ezra B. Taylor, well-known attorney and father of Harriet Taylor Upton. They lived here before moving into the Perkins home now known as the Upton house. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, J.P. Gilbert lived in the home. He was a longtime friend of Mrs. W.D. Packard. Visitors to the house during that time talked business while Warren’s industry was booming.

Conversations of religion, social change, politics, business and founders and leaders of Warren were held in those rooms. Not only by the residents living within these walls, but by neighbors with the names of Perkins, Kinsman, Vautroit, Jacob Cox (Civil War general), Stull (Warren’s mayor) and Gillmer, to name a few.

According to the Ohio History Connection, to be considered historical, you have to ask yourself if it’s significant or why it’s important to the community. Part of that criteria is how have past occupants affected the community. This list of residents meets that criteria.

While it is not on the National Register of Historic Places nor received a State of Ohio Historical Site Marker, this building is a valuable part of Warren history. It is the fourth oldest on Millionaire’s Row, after the Kinsman House, Adams House and Upton home. Chris Klingemier, historical preservationist, dated the home to circa 1845 and is in favor of saving the structure.

An architect with Chambers, Murphy and Berge, restoration architects, also sees the benefit of saving the building. Architects consulted for the addition to the library are among the best for new construction in Trumbull County.

If you needed surgery on your knee, would you go to a specialist in shoulder surgery? With an old building, why wouldn’t you get an opinion of an architect that deals with preservation of old buildings?

CINDEE MINES

Champion

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