National Register reference number.75001312- the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.
The ground it stands on
14,376 words
The chapter on Ashtabula Township in History of Ashtabula County, Ohio, published 1878 names Ashtabula. This is what it says, exactly as the scans read.
On arriving at Buffalo he found that all of the boats and shipping on the lake had been taken by the government, for the purpose of bringing General Har- rison's army down the lake, and the road west from Buffalo was almost impassable, having been badly cut up by the transportation of military stores. Leaving most of his goods in Buffalo, he employed two teams to transport his family and some light goods, and in nine days arrived at Erie, Pennsylvania, where he remained over two months. In the mean time the British took Buffalo and burnt it, and he lost all the goods that he had left there. He was at Erie when General Harrison arrived there from the west, and the town being crowded with soldiers and sailors, he started again, with his family and what property he had, in wagons, and arrived at Ashtabula, January 15, 1814, and being detained there by the birth of a son, and having no merchandise to sell, lie concluded to settle there.
His father and mother were with him, and as his father was a tanner, he at once started a tannery on the west side of Ashtabula creek, and continued in that business for about fifteen years. In the fall of 1827 he commenced merchandising in company with his son-in-law, Charles Crosby, and continued in the business for many years, generally in company with one of his sons.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The
federal wildfire occurrence database
lists 1 fire within 5 miles of Francis E. Harmon House
in 2020, burning under an acre 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
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.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. Museums hold 820 specimens
collected within 10 miles of Francis E. Harmon House between 1872 and 1975: 705 Animalia, 106 Plantae, 7 Fungi, 1 Unrecorded, 1 Chromista.
12 distinct Species records are shown.
Collected by A. B. Fuller, A. Woolman, Baumgardner, L. 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.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists
8 workings within 5 miles of Francis E. Harmon House: 4 past producers, 2 plants, 1 producer, 1 unknown.
3 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Titanium, Metal, Iron, Titanium, Pigment. Distance is straight-line from the
map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring
settlement's page as well.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The National Weather Service names
Ashtabula, the town this property stands in, in 48 storm reports between 1994 and 2025: 30 thunderstorm wind, 14 hail, 4 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.
Widespread basement and street flooding in Ashtabula, with several videos of flowing water of six inches or more across roadways. Radar estimated 2.75 to 3.5 inches of rainfall in a two to three hour period, which roughly equates to a 50 year recurrence interval.
Several roads closed due to flowing high water. Vehicles stranded in high water at West Avenue and West 34th Street, West 58th Street and Jefferson Road. Underpass on Main Avenue inundated with 5 to 6 feet of water, stranding a vehicle. Several reports of flooded basements in the area.
An ice jam on the Ashtabula River at Northcoast Marina and Yacht Club broke loose and snapped the docks apart like twigs. The river also flooded bottom land and at least one road. Other rural roads were flooded by melting piles of snow.
Widespread road flooding in Ashtabula and Plymouth areas. Some reports of basement flooding as well. Many of the roads flooded due to creeks coming out of their banks. A few cars stranded in a flooded underpass on Main Avenue in Ashtabula. Radar estimated 4 to 5.5 inches of rainfall in a 1.5 to 3 hour period. Two rain gauge reports in Plymouth reported nearly 6 inches of rainfall over a three hour period.
Trees and large limbs were downed. Hard hit was the west side of Conneaut where several roads were closed from downed trees. Utility poles were also downed along with some signs and awnings.
A 86 mph thunderstorm wind gust was measured at the Ashtabula Light House. Several dozen trees were downed in the City of Ashtabula. At least two homes were damaged by fallen trees. Other trees were downed to the west of Ashtabula in Saybrook Township.
Trained spotters estimated 60 mph winds in Ashtabula. A few trees were downed in an around the City of Ashtabula. One of the trees landed on a house trailer and caused some structural damage.
3 papers published in this town,
digitised by the Library of Congress and free to read. Every page is searchable, so a name or a street can be
looked for directly in what the town printed about itself at the time.
United States Geological Survey topographic
sheets whose coverage includes this point. Matched by taking the coordinate the National Park Service records for this property, then
testing that coordinate against the published boundary of every 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.
Statement of significance
an enterprising man in farming, trading and shipping. When he in 1893 as being "so far in advance of the residences of those days building indicates the broad mind, liberal character and refinement It is not known whether the nominated house was built after 1863 by Francis, which would be consistent with the style of the a local traditional date which is undocumented, but which would be consistent with the main body of the house. attributed to the Harmon family.
DEC31 1974 Commerce Conservation Military Engineering REGISTER Transportation Theater Architecture losophy Communications Industry Aboriginal NATIONAL Political RECEIVED Agriculture Education Literature Landscape SIGNIFICANCE Prehistoric itarian Social/Human- Sculpture Music died in 1863, his property was divided among three children. The of Mr. Harmon." Religion/Phi. Albert and Gertrude each had a half interest in the "old homestead." porch and eaves, or whether some portion was built in 1832, unusually sophisticated variant of the Italian Villa style.
significant in its own right, and reflects the taste and character In any case, the design of the house is architecturally Invention Urban Planning That house, built in 1828, still stands elsewhere, and was described Its history is subject to some conjecture and inference.The The significance of the Harmon house as it stands is that of portion on which this house stands belonged to Francis E.,and land on which it stands was originally owned by Edwin Harmon, that it not only was an attraction but a source of wonder.This Other (Specify) AREAS OF SIGNIFICANCE (Check One or More as Appropriate) Art Dec. 15, 1962. LATITUDE AND LONGITUDE COORDINATES DEFINING A RECTANGLE LOCATING THE PROPERTY DEFINING THE LENTER POINI OF A PHOPERTY OF LESS THAN TEN ACRES Less than one
Quoted from the National Register nomination
for reference 75001312, 10 pages, held by the National Archives in Record
Group 79. See the
catalogue record.
Listed places nearby
6 within 8 miles
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.
Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
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.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.
Block
