x
Breaking News
More () »

Waterville celebrates founder in bicentennial celebration

If it wasn't for a man named John Pray, there wouldn't be a Waterville. On Sunday, he returned to town, actually it was a reenactor named Jim Conrad, for a special bicentennial celebration
A reenactor plays founder, John Pray, in Waterville bicentennial celebration. (Source: WTOL)

WATERVILLE, OH (WTOL) - If it wasn't for a man named John Pray, there wouldn't be a Waterville.

On Sunday, he returned to town, actually it was a reenactor named Jim Conrad, for a special bicentennial celebration.

For that quaint downtown district in Waterville, you can thank john Pray.

Those historical buildings still standing along neighborhood streets.

Sunday he told his story to an awestruck crowd at Conrad Park on John Pray Day.

Two hundred years ago Monday in 1818,  Pray arrived in Waterville from Smithville, New York with his family and became its founder.

He was looking for a place to start a new colony and found it in Northwest Ohio along the backs of the mighty Maumee River.

He bought three thousand acres of land from the federal government at $1.25 an acre.

"I started with a gristmill on Granger Island which I later moved across the river to the public square. I added another mill, distillery, hemp machine. I was quite the industrialist," he said.

As well as an entrepreneur, farmer, innkeeper and investor.

The rest, as they say, is history.

"I always knew that industry and business would catch on here. And as the town grew away from the river, I'm pleased to see it's a city today but that old historic district is still intact," he said.

Before You Leave, Check This Out