BY RANDY McNUTT
The Cincinnati Enquirer
WAYNESVILLE -- The Quaker Friends' Miami Monthly Meeting Historic District is now on the National Register of Historic Places.
Founded in 1803, the year Ohio became a state, the district at Fourth and High streets became the mother of Quaker meeting sites to the west and helped encourage settlements in Warren and Clinton counties -- including Waynesville, founded in 1797.
In the self-proclaimed Antiques Capital of the Midwest, population 2,500, people take their old buildings seriously. They have restored them and sought government protection for some of the older ones.
"It's unusual to find two meeting houses next to each other," said Judith Williams, a Columbus architectural historian and preservationist who worked on the Quaker project.
The district's centerpiece is the White Brick Meeting House, built in 1811 and used today by the religious group's Hicksite Branch. The two-story, 3,200-square-foot building features a gabled roof with timber trusses.
"Historically, there was no paid minister," Ms. Williams said. "The elders would speak. They believed in the equality in the individual."
Nearby is the Red Brick Meeting House, built in 1836 by the orthodox branch of the Religious Society of Friends. One story, with a simple gable roof, the building was erected on the site where the group built its original log meeting house in 1803.
The district property also includes the Friends Home, erected in 1905, and the Friends Cemetery.
"We're very proud of this," said Milton Cook, 47, of Waynesville, whose family has worshipped in the district for generations.
"We started working on this project ourselves a couple of years ago, and then the wonderful village stepped in to provide us with a grant and Judy Williams to help see us through volumes of pages to fill out."
Linda Jones, Waynesville's clerk-treasurer, said the village wanted to help because the Friends' district is integral to local history.
But the district isn't the first Waynesville site to be on the National Register. There are several others, Greek Revival houses. One is the home of pioneer John Satterthwaite, a Quaker builder who came from Pennsylvania. He is thought to be the builder of the White Brick Meeting House.
Ms. Williams said she became involved because the village wanted to help the Quaker Friends in their effort to obtain a listing on the National Register.
"The site is a beautiful setting that gives you a sense of what it must have looked like in the early 19th century," she said.
In June, she submitted the nomination to the Ohio Historic Site Preservation Advisory Board, which reviews and recommends sites for the National Register. Recently, the site was approved on the national level.
"The White Brick House in particular is worth seeing," Ms. Williams said. "It has been in continuous use since 1811, complete with the original benches and the panels that divided the men's from the women's side.
"The building is remarkable for its preservation and architectural significance -- the vernacular style, which is quite simple.
"Actually, architecture of that period was quite simple. Its simplicity reflected the Quaker ideas of the time -- plain and durable."
Mr. Cook, an eighth-generation Waynesville Quaker,said the district's membership has declined in the last half-century. "We're down to 76 members now," he said. "We had 170 members in the 1940s and 1,800 in the early 1800s, before other meetings started splitting off.
"We were the first meeting west of the Hocking River and the oldest continually used house west of the Alleghenies.
"Every Sunday we keep that up."
The Friends will conduct an open house with tours, a presentation and an actual Quaker meeting 2-4 p.m. Nov. 22. The public is invited.
