This site was the location of a reservoir for the Lake Erie, Alliance and Wheeling Railroad that passed through what is now part of the Iron Horse Trail. Ice was harvested here in the winter and it was used for ice skating. Later, the reservoir was filled in and became Hazel Park. It was used for sports and band practices for the high school and even visiting circus performances. In 1963, this library building was opened and it was renamed for its benefactor, C. J. Rodman.
W. J. Egli & Company fabricates metal products and display fixtures. The company was established in 1968, and moved to this location shortly afterwards. The building located here was originally built in 1935, and has included various businesses through the years, including Linerode’s Feed Mill, Bogg’s Feed & Supply Store, and a Junior Achievement Center.
Knam's Brewery and Lembright Bakery were located on the southwest corner of East Market Street and Mechanic Avenue beginning in 1874. Florian Knam operated a brewery here between 1874 and 1879 in the days before Prohibition. It was built into the side of the hill and had a deep cellar, allowing temperature control for the beer. Lembright Bakery was located here beginning in 1916 and closing in the mid-1960s. The building burned in 2008.
This building on the north side of Market Street between Park Avenue and Mechanic Avenue was home to Hillgreen, Lane & Company from 1900 to 1972. It was built about 1893 for an agricultural implement company, and was later occupied by the Alliance Pants Company. After a fire at the pants company, the building was repaired and Hillgreen, Lane & Company moved in. The company was founded by founded in 1898 by Alfred Hillgreen and Charles Alva Lane. They continued to build pipe organs until it closed in 1972. The building then served as the home of Electronic Circuits & Design until 1986.
This was the location of the one-story passenger depot and freight office for the Lake Erie, Alliance & Wheeling Railroad, in service from 1911 to the 1960s. By 1947 the building was used for storage and sales, and it housed the Alliance Cycle Shop in the 1960s. This location is now home to a restored caboose, which is used for community events and concerts.
The northeast corner of E. Main Street and Mechanic Avenue was the site of the first of three depot locations on the Lake Erie, Alliance & Wheeling (LEA&W) rail line in the 1880s and 1890s. This lot later became the home of Temple of Economy, Shafer Building and the Owl Grill, and today's Alliance Area Chamber of Commerce.
The intersection of Prospect Street and N. Mechanic Avenue has been an active part of downtown Alliance's business history throughout the 20th century and remains so today. The southwest block has been home to a Presbyterian Church, service garages, a skating rink, and the armory for Company K of the Ohio Volunteer Infantry. Today, Kale's Auto Repair Service continues to service automobile customers as it has since 1996. On the northeast block, the King Bee Milling Company, operated by J. C. Henschen, was located here during the 1920s and 1930s. In later years, McKandy's Phillips 66 station was also located here. The service station is now the office for US Coach.
Carl Tanner and Company ran wholesale and retail cheese businesses on this site, and Arnold Tanner was the third generation of the family to conduct the business. The former Tanner Cheese Company building that used to sit here was constructed in 1880. Before it was a cheese house, it served as a planing mill in the 1880s. The business was sold to Bud Twyman in 1973 and was called Carl Tanner and Co. and Twyman Cheese Company until the mid-1980s. The PITTSBURGH, FORT WAYNE & CHICAGO RAILROAD was known originally as the Ohio & Pennsylvania Railroad. It is a major east-west rail line today. Service between Alliance and Pittsburgh began in January 1852.
Matthias Hester and John Miller laid out the village of Freedom in 1838, bounded by Vine Street, Walnut Avenue, Wayne Street and Union Avenue. Several additions were made before the village was incorporated into the new village called Alliance in 1854. Located at the intersection of N. Mechanic and Hester Avenues, Hester Park, the Hester House, and the Hester Block are reminders of the life of Matthias Hester and his legacy. The park once was home to an Octagon Hall, used as a public building. It was built on high piers. During a school exhibition in 1858, some of the piers gave way causing the floor to collapse, and throwing the audience to the street level. One young child was killed and several other people were hurt. The Hester Block is the oldest brick building in the city of Alliance. Originally, it had four apartments, but due to structural problems, now only has two. In 1869, Matthias Hester built a new brick house on the southwest corner of Hester and Mechanic Avenues. Hester lived in this house until his death in 1890.
Alliance began a new era in public school education with the building of the Union School on the southwest corner of N. Park Avenue and Washington Street in 1856. The two-story building had six rooms and employed eight teachers. The Union School was razed in 1892 when the North Park School, otherwise known as Building No. 1, was built. The North Park School suffered a fire in 1942. It stood vacant until it was demolished in August 1964.
Built in about 1842, Samuel Shaffer, a German immigrant who moved to Freedom from Pennsylvania, operated a store here. After the opening of the Cleveland & Pittsburgh railroad in 1851, the house served as the first railroad station. This building was torn down in the mid-1980s. Alliance Rubber was founded in Alliance as a hobby in 1923 by William H. Spencer. It grew from 1 person in a basement to a company of 90 employees by 1955. The company made 300 varieties of rubber bands, and it was the largest company of its kind in the world.
When Freedom was platted in 1838, there was a public square here on the west side of N. Park Avenue, just south of Keystone Street. A stone erected by the Alliance Historical Society in 1956 marks the square and the location of the village well today. In the early days of Alliance, there were two volunteer fire companies in the area, the Babcock Hook and Ladder Company headquartered on S. Freedom Avenue, near City Hall, and the Keystone Company, stationed on the north side of Keystone Street between N. Park and Walnut in the old village of Freedom. The Cleveland and Pittsburgh Railroad, formerly known as Cleveland and Wellsville, had its first passenger service to the village of Freedom from Cleveland on July 4, 1851. All that day a train ran back and forth between Freedom and Limaville, treating people to free rides.
The most prominent of the homes that used to sit along this stretch of N. Park Avenue was the Philip Sharer home with its second story projecting over the first in order to form a front porch. Born near Coblentz, Germany, Sharer was a cabinet maker who settled in Freedom (now Alliance) about 1841. The Sharer house was torn down in the mid-1980s.
Owned and operated by the Alliance Historical Society, this house was built in 1867 for Matthew and Mary Edwards Earley. The style is Italianate and features wide eaves supported by pronounced bracketing. The front porch runs along the entire front and a portion of the side of the house. The Earley's adopted daughter, Mabel Hartzell lived here until her passing in 1954. She willed the home and its contents to the historical society to be used as a museum for the city of Alliance.
This Tour is a Walking Tour.
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Alliance was incorporated as a village in 1854 and included the villages of Williamsport, Freedom, and Liberty. This walk along the Iron Horse Trail will take you from Rodman Public Library's trailhead north past Main Street and into the original village of Freedom, ending at the Mabel Hartzell Historical Home.
