Granville History

Visitors to Granville still take away indelible impressions of a "New England town" set down in the middle of Ohio, and rightly so. The first settlers planned it that way, beginning with two main and wide thoroughfares that intersected at the Town square with churches on its corners, and continuing with 24 blocks of 288 rectangular lots on the original plateau situated a safe 70 feet above the Raccoon Creek floodplain to the south. Nestled there between the three hills. Sugar Loaf rising 55 feet above the plateau on the west, College Hill, 135 feet high to the north, and Mt. Parnassus 105 feet on the east, these New Englanders would soon construct streets called Water and Bowery (now West and East College) or Fair and Equality (now West and East Elm). Indeed, an 1866 Atlas would even have Solemn St. (now East Maple) leading to Maple Grove Cemetery.
Village boundaries now extend well beyond the original plat, as the census has risen from 1,502 in 1940 to about 4,000+ today, including some 2,000 Denison students. Surrounding on three sides is Granville Township containing rolling hills, farmland, and pleasant residential subdivisions. As Denison Professor of History, the late William T. Utter has noted, the New England resemblance remains in the Town plat, in the style and architecture of its old homes and even in much of the tradition and custom of Granville today.

Dr. Utter recognized that by the 1950s significant changes were underway in what had been a quiet Village where many elderly folk resided and everyone went to the Post Office to pick up the daily mail. The multiplication of houses on the outskirts of Town and the increasing number of "predominantly young couples with their growing families" - these together with many more automobiles and trucks heralded a new age for this community. Fortunately in 1962 the state of Ohio completed construction of a four-lane bypass south of Town which relocated state highway Route 16 from the middle of town.

For decades there had been no major industry in Granville, but in 1960 Owens Corning located a research center in the Township along the north side of State Route 16. A research center constructed on the south side of Route 16 by DOW Chemical has become an office park and is currently the site of a 95,000-square-foot building being constructed by Paramount Financial Group. Denison University has gone from 1,250 students to about 2,000, and the downtown area has increasingly grown with banks, boutiques, and fashionable dining and lodging accommodations. Local politics were changed with the adoption of a Village Chader form of government in 1964, bringing in a Village Council/Manager form of government. The Township continues to operate with four elected officials, three trustees, and a clerk. The fire department, supported by local property tax levies, is still mainly volunteer, but now has a larger building, more equipment, and four full-time paid professionals.

Community culture has expanded with weekly papers like the Granville Booster (1950s) and the Granville Sentinel (1970); museums such as the Robbins Hunter in the Avery-Downer House (1981), the Granville Historical Museum (1955), and the Robinson Lifestyle (1983); a major addition to the Public Library (1970) and the Denison Library (1958 and 1981); new churches like St. Edward's Catholic, Pilgrim Lutheran, Latter Day Saints, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Spring Hills Baptist complement the previously existing Methodist, Presbyterian, Baptist, and Episcopal churches.

In addition to Sugar Loaf Hill, which has been preserved from development, the Village and the Thomas J. Evans Foundation have cooperated to provide the community with Wildwood Park, which is managed by the Granville Recreation Commission.  The Village also maintains the 27-acre Fanchion Lewis Park along Jones Road. The Township trustees purchased 53 acres in 1991 for Salt Run Park and 40 acres in 1996 for Raccoon Valley Park that is being used
for soccer and baseball fields.

Granville residents today more often commute to work in Newark or the Columbus metropolitan area, but their families appreciate the amenities of a college Town of modest size and the hometown community atmosphere.