Lighting up the Town

Last week's post on Memorial Day in Medina featured a lot of pictures of the parades around the Square. There was a marked difference in the photos pre-1900 as opposed to after that date. Did you notice?

Medina Square 1889

Medina Square circa 1897

Do you see it now?

Sometime in the intervening years, Medina installed electricity. Didn't really impact last week's blog, but it put that little kernel of curiosity in my brain. Exactly WHEN did Medina get electricity?

{Some of the lines are also telephone lines.}

Bob Hyde's website Beyond the Storefronts is a great place to start off place when researching any  history surrounding the Medina Square. And since he installed a search function, VOILA! Anything I want to find, I can. And I did!

Bob had this picture of the Power Generating Station, and accompanying history about its location at 121 West Smith Road.

According to Bob:

"#121 West Smith Road:

Medina Electric Light and Power Generating Plant, Albert G. Oatman and Ozro Sanders, Props.   (1897-1905)

1.  Albert G. Oatman and Ozro Sanders under the company title of the Medina Electric Light and Power Company have erected substantial brick structure equipped with necessary machinery, power, and dynamos for supplying the town with arc and incandescent lights and power.

2.  The plant was put into operation on September 15, 1897 and already there are 800 incandescent lights supplied to stores, offices, residences and shops in the village.

3.  The rates in effect are reasonable and range from one to five lights furnished for 60 cents each, per month; from five to fifteen at 50 cents and from fifteen to twenty-five lights at 40 cents each, per month.

4.  The Company is equipped for furnishing arc lights for streets, but as for now no contract has been made with the village.  In a few places lights have been provided on a private subscription basis

5.  The plant is equipped with one K. W. generator, one 125 horsepower engine and one 150 horse power boiler, the largest in the town.

6.  Simon S. Oatman bought out A. G. Oatman’s interest in 1905.

Phillips Electric Generating Plant, Judge F. O. Phillips, Prop. (1905-1915)

1.  S. S. Oatman sold Medina Electric Light and Power on Lot 16 to F. O. Phillips for $14,000 in 1905.

Pennsylvania Power Co., Cleveland Southwestern Power Co., Western Reserve Light andPower Co. (1915-1931)

1.  Judge F. O. Phillips sold Phillips Electric to Charles A. Moore of Chicago in 1915.

So, from this information, it looks like Medina got electricity in 1897. 

The Medina Electric and Light Company West Smith Road
Circa 1900-1915

Bob's history on the short lived company seems pretty complete. But is it everything that can be found? Probably, because Bob is an excellent historian.

But to make sure that is ALL the information available about the company, I need to do more research. That is called due diligence.

This cutout is from the 1897 Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps, a database available from within the library. The earlier Sanborn maps, for 1885 and 1892, don't show any kind of power plant.The  Power Company, circled in red, is near the corner of Elmwood and Smith Road. It was there early enough that it could be included in the publication for 1897. But does it predate 1897??

Joann King's excellent book on 19th
century Medina County. 

Joann King, another excellent historian, wrote Medina County Coming of Age 1810-1900. And she has a lot more to say about the beginnings of electrical power in Medina:

"In Medina, council gave Ozro Sanders the first utility franchise to build an electric plant. Individual industries already had their own dynamos used primarily to power machinery, [A.I. Root was one such company] but this company was solely for the benefit of the private subscriber. Sander's first order was for 150 individual lights, 125 were to go into the Phoenix Block. In 1898, this company officially became Medina Electric Light and Power under the leadership of A.G. Oatman and Sanders. In one year, they had 800 light bulbs shining in offices, stores, and homes."  p. 471

It doesn't give the date that the council gave the franchise to Sanders, just the date that the company was named.

Later in the book:

"In 1892, the Ohio Legislature passed a bill allowing Medina Council to hold an election for the purpose of levying the residents 2 mils for electric lights... Voters approved the light plant 355 to 166." And in the next paragraph:

"O. Sanders started building Medina's first electric plant on the northwest side of town near the depot... Three months later he had 500 subscriptions for incandescent lamps and an order from the village for twenty arc street lamps. Medina Council installed four of those lamps in November..."

Slowly lights began to appear around town. In 1897, the Medina Electric Light and Power Company started its engine and nineteenth century life in Medina was a thing of reality."

It still isn't clear when Medina got electricity. Here is what we have learned:

•  In 1892, the Ohio Legislature passed a bill so that city council could put a levy on the ballot for citizens to be taxed for electric lights. And the levy passed.
• When did the Ohio Legislature pass the bill?
• When did the citizens get to vote on the levy?
• Ozro Sanders won the franchise to build the first electric plant. 
• When did city council award the franchise to Sanders?
• When exactly did he build the plant?
• "Slowly lights appear around town" and then the power plant is turned on? What is powering those slowly appearing lights?

From this information, we can estimate that sometime between 1892 and 1897, the city of Medina generated enough electricity to power lights around town.

In order to pin the date down more exactly, more research was needed.

Question #1- When did the Ohio Legislature pass the bill that enabled Medina City Council to try for the levy?
Judy Russell, the Legal Genealogist, is always blogging about tracking down the original laws. She makes it seem easy. It isn't. But...

In the online Journal of the Senate of the State of Ohio, Volume 89, page 372, I found this:

The bill was read 2 more times.
"Mr. Strock" is Mr. Charles Strock from Niles in Trumbull County, Ohio.

"Tuesday, March 15, 1892.
H.B. No. 612 - Mr Strock (by request): To authorize the council of any incorporated village in the state of Ohio, which contained at the last federal census of 1890, or which at any subsequent federal census may contain a population of not less that two thousand and seventy-three nor more that two thousand and eighty-three, to issue bonds and levy a tax for the payment of the same and interest thereon for the purchase and erection of an electric light plant."

WHAT? Did you catch that wording? " population of not less that two thousand and seventy-three nor more that two thousand and eighty-three". That is a very specific size population, with only a 10 person difference. According to Wikipedia, Medina's population in 1890? 2,073. This bill, while not naming Medina specifically, targeted the town especially.

The bill passed the following day.

Question #2 - So, by mid March of 1892, Medina was permitted to put a levy on the ballot. But when did the election take place?

To find this information, I have been scouring the Medina Gazette newspaper microfilm. I have not found the date of the election, but I did find some more information.

Medina Gazette 12 May 1892, page 4.

So the Village Council had approved the tax by mid-May 1892, but Mr. Herman Holmes was not happy with their decision and was filing a lawsuit to stop them from going forward. Mr. Holmes was a Civil War Veteran and Medina business man. His main complaint was that the proposed plant was too expensive. Oh, and he didn't want any poles put on his East Liberty Street property.

Since the common pleas court only met every quarter, progress on the suit was very slow...

Medina Gazette 21 July 1892, page 1

So now we have narrowed the date that Medina got electricity from 1893 to 1897...

And just like the court case, this blog will have to be continued to allow time for more research...

SOURCES:

Beyond the Storefronts http://www.medinasquare.org/

Historical Highlights of Medina
Medina County: Coming of Age
Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps
Wikipedia - Medina census population
Journal of the Senate of the State of Ohio, Volume 89
Medina County Gazette