Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in
1981. 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 Henry County Sheriff's Residence and Jail is a government building in Napoleon, Ohio, United States. Built in 1882 to a design by architect D.W.”
Wikipedia article Henry County Sheriff's Residence and Jail, CC BY-SA 4.0.
one of 4 National Register listings in Henry County · listed in 1981 · category: Building.
Architectural style. Second Empire architecture in the United States and Canada
National Register reference number.81000439- 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
1,008 words
The chapter on Napoleon Township in Fall of Napoleon, published 1907 names Napoleon. This is what it says, exactly as the scans read.
World. - "The story of Napoleon's childhood . . . could not have had an abler or more sympathetic narrator than the author of this very fascinating work ... to be welcomed as an extremely valuable contribution to the study of a superlatively great historic figure."
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The
federal wildfire occurrence database
lists 11 fires within 5 miles of Henry County Sheriff's Residence and Jail between
2020 and 2020, burning about 13 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
6
Missing data/not specified/undetermined
3
Smoking
2
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 131 specimens
collected within 10 miles of Henry County Sheriff's Residence and Jail between 1898 and
1974: 113 Animalia, 9 Plantae, 7 Fungi, 2 Bacteria. 12 distinct Species records are shown.
Collected by Adler, K. K., C.R. Neiswander, Claud Revere Neiswander 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 Henry County Sheriff's Residence and Jail: 1 past producer, 1 plant, 1 producer.
2 still produce. What was taken out: Clay, 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.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The National Weather Service names
Napoleon, the town this property stands in, in 49 storm reports between 1995 and 2026: 37 thunderstorm wind, 10 hail, 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.
SOUTHERN HALF OF THE COUNTY SUSTAINED THE WORST FLOODING. MANY RURAL COUNTY ROADS WERE WASHED OUT TO SOME DEGREE WITH EXTENSIVE DAMAGE TO LOWLAND AGRICULTURAL FARM FIELDS.
Emergency management officials reported uprooted trees and power lines down in and around Napoleon. A work trailer flipped over and was blown onto Scott Street. A tree fell onto a house on Oakwood Avenue.
A trained spotter reported roof fascia ripped off, as well as shingles off a store front roof. Some minor structural damage was noted to the roof as well.
Emergency management officials reported widespread, significant wind damage across the county. Three utility trailers were pushed across the parking lot at the Emergency Operations Center.
2 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
1,960 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.
Statement of significance
(in one paragraph) complexes in the last quarter of the 19th century. The pronounced heighth and verticality of the residence with its tower and the decorative nature of the cell- were designed by the Toledo architect David W. Gibbs, who was responsible for a number his governmental clients. Together the residence/jail and courthouse served as the physical focus of county governmental and justice activities over the past century. Ihe former in particular represents the 19th century desire to combine the official within a single dual-purpose structure. county sheriff's department. communications education 1882 economics 1700-1799 1400-1499 engineering industry commerce humanitarian Builder/Architect Period agriculture 8.
Significance 1900- 1500-1599 Specific dates the distinctive architectural styling utilized for many Ohio county_governmental The present county buildings were constructed in 1882 after a disastrous fire burned - art - archeology-prehistoric .community planning X architecture The Henry County Sheriff's Residence and Jail is significant as a local example of block were fitting representatives of the authority and stature of the county government. Both the Courthouse (NR 2/28/73) and the Sheriff's Residence and Jail roles of jail-keeper with county policemen both administratively and practically the courthouse and the surrounding structures. Local contractors Jacob Karst and William Woodruff constructed the Gibbs designed buildings.
The jail remains as the -exploration/settlement - - philosophy public building commissions reflect Gibbs' apparent feeling that the French Second countys primary prison although the residence has been converted to offices for the 1600-1699 Empire and High Victorian Gothic styles were the most appropriate for the needs of Aldrich, Lewis Cass. History of Henry and Fulton Counties, Ohio. Syracuse, N.Y.: D. Mason & Co., 1888. UMT References The northeastern part of lots 65-68 (these lots include the Courthouse also) bounded by E.
Quoted from the National Register nomination
for reference 81000439, 16 pages, held by the National Archives in Record
Group 79. See the
catalogue record.
Listed places nearby
3 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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