Pleasant Ridge, Cincinnati

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Pleasant Ridge is a quaint, diverse, mostly gaslight residential neighborhood in Cincinnati, Ohio with a small business district occupied largely by long-standing, independent businesses.

In recent years Pleasant Ridge has been abutted by development in the unzoned Columbia Township that has seen the addition of several retailers that have made the area congested with traffic that its infrastructure was not designed to deal with. In 2005 plans were put in place by Hamilton County to alleviate much of this.

Pleasant Ridge has a library, three elementary schools and a community center whose municipal swim team has won multiple Cincinnati City Championship meets throughout the years.

The neighborhood is bordered by the cities of Norwood and Golf Manor, OH, the Village of Amberly, the neighborhoods of Kennedy Heights and Oakley, and unincorporated Columbia Township. Pleasant Ridge is also home to Nativity School, a Catholic K-8 grade school (a National Blue Ribbon School winner).

[edit] History

John Cleves Symmes, congressman from New Jersey, purchased a vast tract of land between the two Miami rivers for less than a $1.00 an acre. Pleasant Ridge marks its beginning as a community in 1795, when land agent Colonel John McFarland bought nearly 1,000 acres (4.0 km²) from Symmes and built a small fort to protect early settlers from Indian attacks. This was one of a series of forts built in the Symmes purchase, ironically, McFarland's Station was actually located in Kennedy Heights rather than Pleasant Ridge. Its name, original legend has it came when a man named John Brewster had lost his wife and baby in childbirth and sought a spot for burial. Upon reaching "a grassy spot...on the brow of a hill overlooking the Mill Creek Valley" Samuel Pierson, a member of the party with him, said "Here is a pleasant ridge"...

There were few settlers in those early years. Pleasant Ridge was developed at the site of an early crossroads. One road, an old Indian trail, wound between the mouth of the Little Miami River and what is now Reading. Originally called Columbia Road this trail became Ridge Road. The other road, a turnpike, was built by early settlers to connect Cincinnati to Zanesville and points east. In 1803 when the road was extended from Sharpsburg (Norwood) to Montgomery, it became known as the Montgomery Turnpike. With the arrival of the turnpike, Pleasant Ridge developed some stopping places for travelers, such as Sudler's Tavern and Auten's Tavern. The area was originally known as Cross Roads, because of the intersection of the Montgomery Pike and Columbia Road (Ridge). Ridge Road connected McFarland's Station with other stations in Carthage and Lockland.

The Presbyterian Church moved from Duck Creek to its present site in 1800 with a school built nearby around 1819. The Church took the name Pleasant Ridge around 1818, and the community is said to have changed from Cross Roads to Pleasant Ridge in 1850.

The first permanent settlers were the Wood family of Chatham, New Jersey. James and Charity Chandler Wood bought 660 acres (2.7 km²) from Colonel McFarland in 1809 for $4.00 per acre. The family, including 10 children, lived in "the fort" until they built a house off Montgomery Pike, with brick burned on site. When James died in 1824, the land was divided among his heirs, and Pleasant Ridge was first platted.

The community of Pleasant Ridge grew slowly. In 1832, the year the post office opened, population was only 100. This was basically a farming community with a few businesses to serve farmers or travelers passing through the turnpike.

Pleasant Ridge was incorporated as a village in 1891 when its population exceeded 1,000. John H. Durrell, businessman and descendant of the original Wood family, became the first mayor. The village enacted certain improvements, such as board sidewalks and oil street lamps. The village had a council, policeman, lamplighter, and fireman.

The petition to be annexed by Cincinnati just 20 years later had a lot of opponents, but the proponents believed the added services would outweigh other disadvantages. Pleasant Ridge became part of Cincinnati on a vote of 260-174.