Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975. A historic map-sheet match is not published yet. The record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary.
“About 1810 the township was surveyed into one hundred lots, numbered from the northwest, but no speedy attempt at settlement followed. In 1813 Elijah Nobles settled on Tinker's ereek near the line of Independence, and was probably the first pioneer of Bedford.”
History of Cuyahoga County Ohio (1870). Machine-read text.
one of 338 National Register listings in Cuyahoga County · listed in 1975 · category: Building · one of 3 National Historic Landmarks in Cuyahoga County.
Sources: the county history on the Internet Archive · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service
An account from the chapter on Bedford city, The inset identifies its exact source book and publication year.
Dr. J. M. Turner, who came about 1828 and lived a little south of the village, was the first physician and was in practice about five years. Dr. Charles Goodrich came about 1830, but fell a victim to the cholera in 1832; Dr. J. P. Robinson was in practice from January, 1882, till his removal to Cleveland in 1865.
The chapter on Bedford City in History of Cuyahoga County Ohio, published 1870 names Bedford. This is what it says, exactly as the scans read.
Tuts township lies on the Summit county line, east of Independence and south of Warrensville. On the east it is bonnded by the township of Solon. It is known in the survey as township number six in range eleven. When it was organized for civil purposes, in 1828, it received its present name at the suggestion of Daniel Benedict, in compliment to the place of his nativity - Bedford, Connecticut.
Passage source: History of Cuyahoga County Ohio, published 1870.
Along the streams the surface of the township is sumewhat broken, but in other parts it is generally level. Being also quite elevated, Bedford is a very healthy township. Heavy forests originally covered the ground, but these have been generally removed, although the appearance of the country is yet pleasantly diversified by bodies of timber which have been allowed to remain in their primitive beauty. The soil is variable, but is usually a light loam. It is generally free from stones, and may be cultivated with ease. It is fertile, and yields the ordinary products of this part of the State, but dairying has, to a large extent, become the chief industrial pursuit of the inhabitants.
Passage source: History of Cuyahoga County Ohio, published 1870.
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 Bedford City - 7,074 words on its settlement, mills, schools and churches.
Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 2 fires within 5 miles of Bedford Township Hall between 1993 and 2000, burning about 7 acres in total. None started naturally. 1 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 |
|---|---|
| Arson/incendiarism | 1 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1 |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 21 September 1993 | Arson/incendiarism | under an acre | Cuyahoga Valley National Park | VANACHEK |
| 28 March 2000 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 7.3 acres | Cuyahoga Valley National Park | STONE |
Regional context, not property-specific evidence. Museums hold 2,020 specimens collected within 10 miles of Bedford Township Hall between 1876 and 1975: 1,934 Animalia, 49 Plantae, 33 Fungi, 3 Protozoa, 1 incertae sedis. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by A. D. Huryn, A. D. Selby, A. Hall 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.
| Image | Species | Year | Collected by | Where, as recorded |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | Osmunda claytoniana L. | 1894 | Winkler, H.J. | Cleveland. |
 | Botrychium virginianum (L.) Sw. | 1897 | Winkler, H.J. | Woods, Cleveland. |
 | Claytonia virginica L. | 1897 | Watson,J.R. s.n. [1897-04] | [label: North Ohio Flora. J.R. Watson, Berea, O.] Cuyahoga Co. |
 | Dendroica caerulescens caerulescens (J.F.Gmelin, 1789) | 1876 | A. Hall | unspecified |
 | Dendroica castanea (A.Wilson, 1810) | 1876 | A. Hall | unspecified |
 | Dendroica fusca (Statius Müller, 1776) | 1876 | A. Hall | unspecified |
 | Dendroica striata (J.R.Forster, 1772) | 1876 | A. Hall | unspecified |
 | Seiurus aurocapilla aurocapilla (Linnaeus, 1766) | 1876 | A. Hall | unspecified |
 | Baeolophus bicolor bicolor (Linnaeus, 1766) | 1877 | A. Hall | unspecified |
 | Bombycilla cedrorum Vieillot, 1808 | 1877 | A. Hall | unspecified |
 | Betula L. | 1888 | Jasliafro | Cleveland; Lake View |
 | Cryptotaenia canadensis (L.) DC. | 1890 | R. H. Ingraham | Miles |
All 2,020 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.
Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 7 workings within 5 miles of Bedford Township Hall: 4 past producers, 2 producers, 1 unknown. 2 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Clay, Zirconium, Stone, Crushed/Broken. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Where | Site | Commodity | Status | Recorded |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hydraulic Shale Pit | Clay | Producer | ||
| Rockside Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Producer | ||
| Zircoa Refractories/ Solon, Ohio | Zirconium | Unknown | ||
| Leone Sand and Gravel Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Past Producer | Sedimentary | |
| Leone Sand and Gravel Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Past Producer | ||
| Terra Visa Gravel Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Past Producer | Sedimentary | |
| Terra Visa Gravel Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Past Producer |
Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Bedford, the town this property stands in, in 12 storm reports between 1999 and 2026: 5 hail, 5 thunderstorm wind, 2 flash flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| April 2026 | Hail | Bedford | $1,000,000 | Multiple reports of hail up to golf ball-size to slightly larger than hen egg-size in Bedford. For example, received a picture of a 2.25 diameter hailstone, measured with a ruler, in Bedford. Also, wind-driven severe hail damaged some of the siding and a window of a house in the town. According to the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Bedford's mayor estimated the severe hailstorm caused $1 million in damage to city hall and the surrounding city government complex alone. |
| November 2002 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bedford | $15,000 | Thunderstorm winds downed one tree and several large limbs. |
| June 2005 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bedford | $10,000 | Several trees and power lines down reported from thunderstorm winds. |
| June 1999 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bedford | $5,000 | Large trees downed |
| June 2008 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bedford | $3,000 | Thunderstorm winds downed several large tree limbs. |
| April 2026 | Hail | Bedford | - | Hail up to hen egg-size about one-mile NNE of Bedford. |
| August 2023 | Flash Flood | Bedford | - | Multiple road closures in and around Solon due to flash flooding. Road closures include US-422 at Brainard Road and Bainbridge Road near Harper Road. Radar estimated 1.75 to 2.25 inches of rainfall in a three hour period, with most of the rain falling in a 60 to 90 minute period. |
| July 2023 | Hail | Bedford | - | Hail up to half dollar-size in Bedford. |
| March 2020 | Flash Flood | Bedford | - | At the USGS Tinkers Creek gage at Bedford, Ohio (No. 04207200), on March 29th the Creek crested at 530 am with a stage of 8.44 feet and a flow of 4690 cfs as a 10-year flood, which put it just below the flood of February 28, 2011. Backwater from the Cuyahoga River exasperated flooding near the confluence near Valley View. |
| June 2020 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bedford | - | Numerous trees down in Bedford. One tree down in Oakwood. |
| June 2007 | Hail | Bedford | - | Nickel size hail was observed. |
| July 1999 | Hail | Bedford | - | no account filed |
No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.
Sanborn surveyors printed an index of the town's establishments at the front of each atlas. This property is named in one, read straight off the scanned sheet.
When this property was proposed for the National Register, someone wrote the case for it: what the building is, and why it matters. That document is a federal record in the public domain. It is quoted below word for word, never summarised. The text was read off the scanned case file by machine, so the occasional stray character is the recogniser's and the 1970s typewriter's.
Ruins roof has tall narrow dormers with small pediments.The tower iron railing.The stone arches over the entrance and the windows of the side elevations are flush with the wall rather than molded PERIOD (Check One or More as Appropriate) - Pre-Columbian: - 15th Century - 20th Century SPECIFIC DATE(S) (If Applicable and Known) - Historic Indus try - Science Landscape - Military - Transportation STATEMENT OF
included a tannery, a foundry, mills and cheese factories. The Archibald Willard, painter of "The Spirit of '76," in 1836. The furnishings. The architect was Frank D. Marble, a member of Willoughby. The foundation was laid by Al Spafford, a builder who was the "Opera House," the town auditorium for lectures, debates occupying it until 1963. Standing vacant, the building was finally 1874-1875 Commerce losophy Architecture Conservation Aboriginal Military Engineering Literature Communications Education Prehistoric Transportation Political Science Music Agriculture Theater Religion/Phi Invention make it somewhat more ambitious than the average town hall in Social/Human- increased communications to the east and west. Sculpture restoration project was a model of local initiative and enterprise.
Landscape provincial variant of the Second Empire style, but its three stories and entertainments of all kinds.The third floor was built for the The first floor housed the township offices.The second floor arrival of the Cleveland and Pittsburgh Railroad in 1849 radically Masonic Lodge and other fraternal groups.In 195l the township Canal passed only four miles west of Bedford, and its completion Industry viaduct over Tinker's Creek. the second half of the century.The builder was David Law of The Bedford Township Hall is an excellent example ofa the Western Reserve of Ohio. one of the most influential families in the fortunes of Bedford in was organized.
As with most frontier villages, it grew because of 18l6,has a national reputation.Bedford was the birthplace of was dissolved, and the City of Bedford acquired the building, constructed the four great arches of the 1o0 foot tall railroad In 1874 the township was authorized to issue bonds for a township hall costing $8,000. The:final cost was $15,000,including its location on a stream, Tinker's Creek.
The whole case file for this property - 2,924 words, 20 pages, reproduced complete.
Quoted from the National Register nomination for reference 02001455, 20 pages, held by the National Archives in Record Group 79. See the catalogue record.
Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.
| Photograph | Property | Distance | Listed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gates, Holsey, House | under 500 feet | 1975 | |
| Dunham, Hezekiah, House | under 500 feet | 1975 | |
| Cleveland And Pittsburgh Railroad Bridge | 0.4 miles | 1975 | |
| Drake, Alonzo, House | 2.3 miles | 1978 | |
| Beehive School | 3.8 miles | 1984 | |
| Frazee, Stephen, House | 3.9 miles | 1976 |
| National Archives record | The nomination case file for reference 02001455 in Record Group 79. |
| Cuyahoga County | All 338 listed properties in this county. |
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