A Belmont County Treasure

All United States counties (with the exception of some in New England, which serve only ceremonial purposes) valuate real estate for the sake of levying taxes. In Ohio, auditors handle this task. Today's revaluations are grand affairs, with most counties opting (in part, at least) to delegate the chore to mass appraisal firms; in the nineteenth century, though, reassessments were often conducted locally. Accordingly, tax records vary in quality and availability. Most are buried in county archives (or, perhaps, housed at the Ohio Historical Society), and few websites give access to the information.

Belmont County's excellent "Tax Maps" page provides data from the 1870, 1880, 1890, 1900, and 1910 reappraisals. Unlike many Ohio tax records of the nineteenth century, which mention only financial information (a property's worth, the value of taxes owed by its owner, and the like), Belmont County's papers describe its buildings. The 1880 sheet for Section 32, Mead Township is typical of those in the collection, and mentions ten frame dwellings, a grist mill — worth $1,200 (in 2015 dollars, $29,731) — and one "House and Engine." (1) The 1870 tax list for Section 18, Pultney Township describes six tracts, on which stood — collectively — five log houses, five frame barns, and a building complex sufficiently large to defy accurate description. The tax records also chronicle land use. The complex mentioned above (owned by one George Neff), for instance, accompanied 57 acres, of which 42 served as cropland, 12 were covered by meadow, and three remained forested.

The records, lovely though they may be, are riddled with inaccuracies. In some townships, assessors classified both frame and log structures as "frame"; in others, appraisers distinguished between the two types of construction. Given Belmont County's rugged terrain, a few isolated (or valueless) buildings — concealed in hollows, or perched on ridges — were no doubt overlooked.

Eventually, if time permits, I'll sift through the records, match log buildings with particular locations, and thereby create Ohio's first (fairly) accurate map of log structures existing in the 19th century.

1) Here, the meaning of "Engine" is unclear. Section 32 borders the Ohio River, and is bisected by the Central Ohio Railroad right-of-way. "Engine," then, may describe an industrial building associated with the river or railroad.