Built in 1856. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in
1978. 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.
From the record
“The Elam Drake House was a historic house in Columbus, Ohio, United States. The house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978.”
Wikipedia article Elam Drake House, CC BY-SA 4.0.
one of 295 National Register listings in Franklin County · listed in 1978 · category: Building · built in 1856 · one of 3 National Historic Landmarks in Franklin County.
National Register reference number.78002064- 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
829 words
The chapter on Mifflin Township in History of Franklin County [Ohio]:, published 1858 names Columbus. This is what it says, exactly as the scans read.
In 1852, Messrs. Solomon and George W. Beers, laid out some lots on the roadside between Clintonville and Columbus, and had their plat recorded, and named the place " North Columbus ;" in which some considerable improvements have been made.
There are in this township three churches and three cemeteries - a Methodist Church and burying place on the Worthington plank road, near the residence of Rev. Jason Bull ; and another about five miles from Columbus, on the Lockwin plank road, near the residence of G. S. Innis, Esq. ; and a church at Clintonville, belonging to the Christian denomination ; and a burying place three or four miles north of Columbus, on the west side of the Olentangy.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The
federal wildfire occurrence database
lists 1 fire within 5 miles of Drake, Elam, House between
2007 and 2007, burning about 0 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
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 10,684 specimens
collected within 10 miles of Drake, Elam, House between 1804 and
1975: 8,688 Animalia, 1,277 Fungi, 573 Plantae, 117 Chromista, 28 Unrecorded, 1 Protozoa. 12 distinct Species records are shown.
Collected by 19 V 1938 in original publication, Knull, =, ? 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
3 workings within 5 miles of Drake, Elam, House: 1 plant, 1 producer, 1 past producer.
2 still produce. What was taken out: Clay, Zinc, Sulfur, Sulfuric Acid. 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
Columbus, the town this property stands in, in 107 storm reports between 1993 and 2026: 56 thunderstorm wind, 26 hail, 13 flash flood, 11 flood.
The reports record 9 injuries. 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.
Trees were downed, some on power lines. Four golfers were injured after lightning struck the shelter house they entered to take shelter from the storm.
Trees were downed at several locations. Winds were measured at 59 mph at Port Columbus Airport. Four men were injured at an outdoor amphitheater when the tent they occupied was blown over.
A microburst, with winds estimated to be between 80 and 100 mph, struck the west side of Columbus, destroying roofs of two industrial buildings. The debris from the roofs stretched 600 yards. A tractor-semitrailer was also blown over, injuring one male.
Damage was first observed on Deserette Court. The west-facing|side of several housing units had shutters torn off and also|experienced minor siding damage. This is where it appears the|tornado first touched down.||On the opposite side of Deserette Court, additional shutter and|siding damage was observed, and primarily affected the east-facing|side of the housing units.||Damage continued to the east onto Boyleston Boulevard, with the|garage door of one home completely destroyed and walls of the|garage experiencing significant damage. Siding and roof damage was|also observed on this home, and damage is assessed to be in the|EF0 category, with winds around 80 mph. An eyewitness also stated|that she was looking west and saw a tornado moving toward|Boyleston Boulevard.||A swath of damage continued to the east, affecting homes along|Niantic Drive and Hingham Lane. Much of the damage was associated|with trees, where large tree branches in the back yards of|several homes on both Niantic Drive and Hingham Lane were snapped.|A convergent pattern was observed from 10 to 12 inch diameter tree|branches. Some damage to homes was also observed, including a|large portion of siding being stripped off the east-facing side of|a two story home. Minor roof damage was also noted on several|homes.||Damage became more sparse further east along Hingham Lane and was|confined to a few large hardwood tree branches being snapped off.
Two to three feet of water on some roads submerged some cars and caused others to float. On Leonard Street and 5th Avenue, a foot of water was entering the main level of some homes.
Roofing materials were removed from several buildings, a gutter was blown down, power lines were downed, and fencing was partially blown over in northeastern Columbus due to damaging thunderstorm winds. These winds also blew a large tree down onto a house on Schleppi Road.
10 papers published in this town,
digitised by the Library of Congress and free to read: 0 issues,
0 pages. 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.
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.
From the nomination file
1,827 words on record
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.
Description of the property
plain stone lintels and lug sills. The east elevation has been altered to accomodate a glass sun porch which was added some time ago. This portion of the house appears to have been built as one large room accomodating all living, sleeping and cooking west elevation has three 6/6 double hung windows in its plain stone lintels and front door and porch with stone steps at the approach, marking it as the main en- one at each gable end. coursed rubble stone foundation. A plain, flush door leads to kitchen on the east A square chimney penetrates through the roof. The brick barn is located north of the house and was built in 1867.
The barn was CONDITION DATE EXCELLENT MOVED FAIR XGOOD XALTERED _UNALTERED brick constructed in American bond on a coursed rubble stone foundation.This portion _DETERIORATED appears to have been originally slate.Two brick chimneys project through the roof- functions.This portion of the house was built in 1856.
_RUINS a window opening which was closed when lofts were added sometime after the initial CHECK ONE of the house isl story in height and is square in plan.The gable roof has projecting are located on the eave walls also with segmental heads.A flush door leads to the Present description of the house-The north end or original end of the building is bond on a coursed rubble stone foundation.It is rectangular in plan and isl 1/2 edge.The west elevation has two 6/6 double hung windows with a closed window door.
19th century. The builder, Elam Drake, was born in Connecticut in 1812 where his father, Elias, was a brick mason. He moved to Franklin County, Ohio in 1831 and lived He began working as a brick layer and plasterer - trades learned from his father. today as an unusual example of a complete farmstead untouched by technological progress. Of special interest is the thrashing barn, constructed of brick; it is one of the few brick barns in the area and is probably the best preserved. 1500-1599 EDUCATION ART ARCHEOLOGY-HISTORIC 1800-1899 RELIGION LAW AGRICULTURE PERIOD ENGINEERING Barn THEATER SIGNIFICANCE MILITARY INDUSTRY 1900- XARCHITECTURE _EXPLORATION/SETTLEMENT _ECONOMICS constructing brick commercial store fronts and building facades in the city.
Eventually Drake began contracting and building in Franklin and adjoining counties. LITERATURE _POLITICS/GOVERNMENT _COMMUNICATIONS construction the buildings have stood without major alterations or repair and stand -1400-1499 -1700-1799 -CONSERVATION He gained community recognition for his work and dozens of the best residences in -1600-1699 Drake assisted in the erection of the first brick house in Columbus and was a"first- farming and built the north portion of the existing brick house along with the summer _PHILOSOPHY SCULPTURE House 1856 This farmstead stands today as an excellent example of a typical farm grouping of the in a log cabin along the Johnstown and Columbus Pike on the site of the existing house.
made from clay pits on the original 62 acre site which was recorded as a highly _SCIENCE - MUSIC -COMMUNITY PLANNING ARCHEOLOGY-PREHISTORIC the house appears to have been constructed sometime between those dates.Brick was _INVENTION Columbus stand as monuments to his expertise and skill.In 1856 he retired to take up 10
Quoted from the National Register nomination
for reference 78002064, 13 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.
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