Decorative drawing: a small American settlement seen from a low hill. Not a photograph of this place.

New Reading, Ohio

11 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1909 and the latest in 1984. It stands in Reading Township. It lies in ZIP code area 43783. It stands on Muddy Run. The Survey maps it on the Somerset quadrangle. It stands 3,520 feet above sea level.

New Reading within Perry County

Then and now

1909 to 1984

The same ground, surveyed 75 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.

Topographic sheet of New Reading, surveyed 1984

Topographic sheet of New Reading, surveyed 1909

Topographic sheets covering this place

11 sheets

Matched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.

In the county-history sources

20,608 words on this township

1883 History Perry County, Ohio, published 1883 names this settlement in its chapter on Reading Township. These are the passages that mention it, exactly as the scans read.

It is not known to a certainty who erected the first cabin on a lot of the platted village, but it is probable that several persons built during the same season. 'The place grew slowly enough at first, for Overmyertown (now New Reading) was a rival, and an older town, and there was, at that time, nothing in the nature of the locality or surroundings, to cause villages to grow with any great rapidity. Edward Danison, now in his eighty-eigth year, a citizen of New Lexington, has a very clear remembrance of Somerset when it contained only five or six houses. Mr. Danison was a youth of seventeen or eighteen years at that time, and lived with his parents in Madison township. He says the little village of Somerset, for several years, is easily described, as it consisted of a couple of

Passage source: 1883 History Perry County, Ohio, published 1883.

New Rrapinc. - New Reading, for a long time better known as Overmyertown, situated three miles from Somerset, in the western part of Reading township. was laid out in 1805, by Peter Overmyer, father of the venerable Peter Overmyer, who now resides in the vicinity of New Reading. This village is the oldest in the county, antedating Somerset, Rehoboth, Thornville, New Lexington, and all the other villages of the county. Wheh the county of Perry was formed, New Reading was a candidate for the seat of justice, and its citizens were disappointed and displeased when they failed to secure the location. The village has just about held its own for sixty years and more. It contains two churches, a schoolhouse, store, physician, a few shops, and several neat and comfortable private residences, and had, in June, 1880, one hundred and eighteen inhabitants. "Phe town is handsomely situated, and is surrounded by a country not only ferule and healthy, but one of the loveliest to be found anywhere in the State, and capable of being made almost a second paradise.

Passage source: 1883 History Perry County, Ohio, published 1883.

Vhe Lutheran Church, of New Reading, was the first church organized in what is now Perry county, though in respect to date it only preceded Zion (Rible's), of Thorn township, a few months, both being organized in the same year, 1805. The church was ogganized under the ministry of Rey. William Foster. the venerable father of Lutheranism in Perry county, who departed this life in 1815. "There is a little uncertainty as to the date of the erection of the first edifice, but it was about 1812-13. It was a two-story log building, and was occupied a good many years. The present'edifice is a brick structure, and of more modern belongings. The Overmyers, Whitmers, Auspachs, Poormans, Shriders .and Bowmans, were among the first members. Regular preaching and Sabbath school are sustained. "The church site is a very

Passage source: 1883 History Perry County, Ohio, published 1883.

Machine-read from a century-old scan, so expect the errors a machine makes: misspelled names, dropped words, stray characters.

Read the whole chapter on Reading Township - it names this place 3 more 3 times.

Fires near this place

18 since 2007

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 18 fires within 5 miles of New Reading between 2007 and 2020, burning about 31 acres in total. None started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Debris and open burning	8
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	6
Recreation and ceremony	4

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
7 September 2007	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Ohio Department of Natural Resources	not named
22 September 2015	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	1.0 acres	Ohio Department of Natural Resources	2223
9 July 2016	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Ohio Department of Natural Resources	5126
10 April 2019	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Ohio Department of Natural Resources	15132
9 March 2020	Debris and open burning	1.4 acres	Ohio Department of Natural Resources	15487
8 March 2020	Debris and open burning	1.0 acres	Ohio Department of Natural Resources	15486
22 March 2014	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	8.0 acres	Ohio Department of Natural Resources	not named
18 March 2018	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Ohio Department of Natural Resources	13785

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Perry County

Specimens collected near this place

12 of 255 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. Museums hold 255 specimens collected within 10 miles of New Reading between 1891 and 1975: 224 Animalia, 20 Fungi, 8 Plantae, 2 Unrecorded, 1 Protozoa. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by Bergstrom, J., Black R. J., Buchanan, J. and others. Each is a physical object with a catalogue number, and each entry opens the museum's record. This is what was collected and kept, not a survey of what lives here - nothing can be concluded from a species being absent.

Species	Year	Collected by	Where, as recorded
Uromyces junci-effusi P.Syd. & Syd.	1910	W. A. Kellerman
Equisetum arvense L.	1937	Sharps, M.E.	Rush Creek Twp.
Holwaya gigantea (Peck) E.J.Durand	1891	W. A. Kellerman	[Specific locality illegible.]
Porella platyphylla (L.) Pfeiff.	1891	W. C. Werner
Puccinia schedonnardi Kellerm. & Swingle	1895	W. A. Kellerman
Dicentra cucullaria (L.) Bernh.	1900	Williamson, E.B.	New Salem
Uromyces junci Tul.	1901	W. A. Kellerman	Junction City
Natrix kirtlandii (Kennicott, 1856)	1902	Dilto, C. R.	Perry Co., Ohio
Puccinia muhlenbergiae Arthur & Holw.	1902	W. A. Kellerman & J. McOwen Jr.
Uromyces (Link) Unger, 1833	1902	W. A. Kellerman	Buckeye Lake
Podosphaera oxyacanthae (DC.) de Bary	1903	Black R. J.	Bremen
Endothia fluens (Sowerby) Shear & N.E.Stevens	1912	Nixon E. L.	Perry Co.

All 255 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Mines and quarries near this place

3 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 3 workings within 5 miles of New Reading: 1 producer, 1 plant, 1 past producer. 2 still produce. What was taken out: Stone, Crushed/Broken, Limestone, General. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
Busse Quarry	Limestone, General	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Busse Quarry & Mill	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Plant
Glass Rock Quarry	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Producer

Every working recorded in Perry County

Nearest settlements

The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.

Place	Distance	Sheets
Somerset	2.8 miles	11
Wellan (historical)	3.0 miles	11
Ziontown	3.1 miles	11
Carthon	4.3 miles	13
Bruno	4.3 miles	12
Avlon	4.9 miles	13
Chalfants	5.4 miles	11
Glass Rock	5.7 miles	12

Elsewhere

Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.

Wikipedia article on New Reading	An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q14716751	The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0).

Provenance

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 1065133. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.

Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.

Specimens. Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), https://www.gbif.org/. Only records licensed CC0 or CC BY are used. Records licensed CC BY-NC are excluded because this site carries advertising. Images are checked individually and any whose licence is non-commercial, no-derivatives or unreadable is refused.

Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.