GRANVILLE and COLUMBUS

Multiple routes lead to Granville (and Newark) from Columbus; or exit I-70 at SR 37, which is also coming up from Lancaster.

Broadway,Granville

Granville: Founded by New Englanders eager to create an environment that would help them feel at home, Granville has remained an exquisite town. Along Broadway are beautiful churches, an exceptional Greek Revival mansion, a good selection of local shops and cafés, and two wonderful historic inns to use as a base for visiting central Ohio: The Granville Inn is styled after an English Manor House, while the Buxton Inn across the street is a collection of old houses and an inn dating back to 1812. Both have excellent restaurants. There is a small but interesting historical society museum. Denison University’s meandering drives and imposing academic architecture occupy the prominent hilltop above the village.

Alligator Effigy: Just outside town to the east is the greatest animal effigy in Ohio, after the Great Serpent, which has also been recently dated to the same AD 1000 – 1200 time period. Probably mis-named by early settlers, the creature is more likely an opossum or the underwater panther prominent in Indian traditions. Preserved by the Licking County Historical Society, it is accessible from the old Newark-Granville road: take Broadway heading east, and after about a mile enter the “Bryn du Woods” subdivision on the left and follow the street as it curves to the left and climbs to the hilltop. The effigy lies atop the cul-de-sac at the end, and is best seen in very early or very late sunlight when the shadows are long. The head, paws, and spiraling tail are visible, plus a stone-covered extension from its body which was some kind of altar, the scene of many fires. The beautiful views from this hilltop (between the large new houses) extend westward to open plains beyond Granville, and eastward into the defined valley terraces across which the Newark Earthworks were laid out. The builders of the effigy no doubt appreciated these relationships, the prominence of this spot in encompassing the dual ecologies, and especially the spectacular nearby earthworks which were already about 800 years old.

Alligator Effigy,Granville

Columbus via East Broad Street: The short drive from Granville into the city of Columbus is rewarded with a thriving arts and cultural scene, the distinctive Greek Revival Ohio State Capitol Building downtown, the Ohio State University, several historic districts, and the Ohio Historical Center with its extensive collections and exhibits on ancient and early Ohio. Several routes are available, though State Route 16 offers an especially informative and pleasant cross section of a typical American city’s growth rings: from agricultural countryside, to various kinds of subdivisions and commercial developments both new and old, to older upscale districts (Bexley), to grand and venerable urban institutions, and into the heart of the city.

State Capitol Building: In the heart of downtown Columbus, this unusual building was built between 1838 and 1861, its austere, white, Greek-inspired imagery one of the few in the country not directly inspired by the domed US Capitol Building in Washington. It preserves in its basement crypt level the rubble stone footings (visible in the walls around the gift shop) that were taken from the nearby Mound Street Mound, as was the clay to make many of the bricks in the building’s inner walls. A painting in the Rotunda depicts the signing of the 1795 Treaty of Greenville, the effort following the Battle of Fallen Timbers to delineate a boundary across Ohio separating Indian from settler lands. The bookstore is a good source for materials on state history. Nearby are two other noteworthy buildings, the ornate, white Leveque Tower, and the quirkily Ionic Columbus City Hall.

Ohio State Capitol

Ohio State and Historic Districts: Lively urban districts surround the huge campus of The Ohio State University, and its world-famous Wexner Center for the Arts. Short North (along North High Street with its many bars, galleries, and restaurants) and the adjacent Victorian Village (with deeply shaded streets and large, early-twentieth-century houses) connect the University area with downtown. Just south of downtown is the beautifully preserved and especially picturesque German Village neighborhood, with its quaint brick houses, brick sidewalks and streets, and good selection of intimately-scaled shopping, drinking, and dining establishments.

The Ohio Historical Center: About three miles north of downtown along I-71 (Exit 111, 17th Avenue), is the ominous but intriguing 1970s concrete cube containing the headquarters and exhibits of the Ohio Historical Society. This is the place to see the best presented and most brilliant Adena, Hopewell, and Fort Ancient era artifacts from the many earthwork and settlement sites throughout the region. Startling craftsmanship, wrought upon precious, luminous materials brought to Ohio from all over North America, speak of the genius and cultural reach of the mound and earthwork builders, and their ways of interpreting the world around them in both ceremonial and functional objects. The Society also maintains extensive archives and research collections.

Mica Hand, OHS Collections

Newark Shaman, OHS Collections

Other Columbus Area Earthworks: The Shrum Mound in Campbell Park (five miles northwest of downtown Columbus, about one-half mile south of the intersection of McKinley Avenue and Trabue Road) is a well-preserved, 20-foot tall, Adena-era conical mound. There are steps to climb to the top; adjacent is an old limestone quarry. The Highbanks Metro Park is just north of the city, on High Street (US 23, 2½ miles north of I-270), and contains two mounds associated with the Adena culture, and a semi-circular earthen enclosure lying atop a 100 foot cliff overlooking the Olentangy River. There are three gateways in the approximately-three-foot-high wall. Also called the Orange Township Works, they can be reached by a 2.3-mile loop trail through steep, wooded ravines. The park’s Nature Center has interpretive exhibits on the earthworks, as well as the park’s spectacular eagles and wildflowers.

Eating and Sleeping: In Granville, the Granville Inn (314 E. Broadway; 740 587 3333) and the Buxton Inn (313 East Broadway; 740 587 0001) both exude the town’s historic charm. Or select the area’s premier family resort, the Cherry Valley Lodge, home of the Coco Key Indoor Water Park (2299 Cherry Valley Road, Newark; 740 788 1200). Granville has several charming cafés, plus the superb gourmet Short Story Brasserie at the south edge of the village. The historic districts in Columbus offer many excellent cafés, but especially try Lindey’s (169 E. Beck Street, at Mohawk, in German Village). For more details on how to plan a visit in the Granville and Newark area, contact the Licking County Convention and Visitors Bureau at: http://www.lccvb.com.

Walls and Gateways: The northernmost sides of the Octagon skirt the edge of the upper river terrace on which it is built. Views down over the narrow lower terrace and into Raccoon Creek remind us how carefully the ancients sited their monumental geometric earthworks, on perfectly level, well drained gravelly terrain, safely out of the reach of erosion and flooding. The eastern, somewhat overgrown gateway of the Octagon touches the modern road; the southern opens to a small stretch of grass that also contains an exquisite small circular enclosure. This is one of many that accompanied the Newark Earthworks, as recorded on 19th century plans.

The Great Hopewell Road: From near this small circle, remnants of other low embankments are the beginnings of a long straight roadway that headed off to the southwest. Early maps show these continuing as perfectly straight parallel lines, about 180 feet apart and about 3 feet high, for at least six miles. If indeed this monumental pathway, as wide as a modern interstate highway, continued at this angle for sixty miles, as Dr. Bradley Lepper has suggested is possible, it would have arrived exactly at Chillicothe, the other major Hopewell-era cultural center. Small traces survive in patches of woods south of town; several more segments have been confirmed on aerial photos from the 1930s.

Hilltop Views: The northernmost sides of the Octagon skirt the edge of the upper river terrace on which it is built. Views down over the narrow lower terrace and into Raccoon Creek remind us how carefully the ancients sited their monumental geometric earthworks, on perfectly level, well drained gravelly terrain, safely out of the reach of erosion and flooding. The eastern, somewhat overgrown gateway of the Octagon touches the modern road; the southern opens to a small stretch of grass that also contains an exquisite small circular enclosure. This is one of many that accompanied the Newark Earthworks, as recorded on 19th century plans.

Eating and Sleeping: On the Courthouse Square in Newark are the Dal Cielo and the Natoma restaurants. Conveniently located around the corner is the Place Off the Square (a modern inn affiliated with the famed Longaberger Basket Company, at 50 North Second Street; 740 322 6455). Many chain locations for food and lodging are positioned along SR 79 in Heath, heading south from the Great Circle.