lakewood History
|
This is an expanded version of a speech given at the opening of the Lakewood Centennial Ceremonies, August 1993, by the noted Lakewood Village Historian, Helen G. Ebersole.
The area now covered by the village of Lakewood originally was divided into large farms. The owners of those large tracts of land are memorialized in local place names: Gifford, Southland, Bentley, Cowing, Winch, Stoneman, and Lowe. The land along the lake was periodically occupied by hunters and fishermen, and ice harvesters in the winter. The first settlement of any size took place along the lakeshore, and Lakewood’s history actually began as it developed into a summer resort. In 1870 John Cowing built a hotel, the Cowing House, on that part of his farm which bordered on the lake. The Cowing House became The Lakeview House in 1873 and the small settlement, known as Lakeview, became Lakewood in 1879. In the mid 1870s Warren Packard from Warren, Ohio, and his brother, John, from Meadville, Pennsylvania came to the Lakewood area and bought the hotel and several acres of the land. On their lakefront property, which they called the Lakeview Tract, the two brothers built a number of Gothic style summer cottages for rental purposes. Warren Packard built himself a $3,000 villa near the hotel. They also built a sawmill on property they owned near the railroad track to provide lumber for their extensive building projects. |
Village Historian |
