The Jacob Light House is a historic residence in the city of

Washington Court House Washington Court House (often abbreviated as Washington C.H.) is a city in Union Township, Fayette County, Ohio. It is the county seat of Fayette County and is located between Cincinnati and Columbus. The population grew almost 1.5% from 2010 to ...

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

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. Once home to a prominent local craftsman, it has been designated a

historic site A historic site or heritage site is an official location where pieces of political, military, cultural, or social history have been preserved due to their cultural heritage value. Historic sites are usually protected by law, and many have been rec ...

as a well-preserved example of the Italianate style of architecture. With the coming of multiple railroad lines, Washington Court House became an increasingly important center of commerce in the third quarter of the nineteenth century. Among those attracted to the city was Jacob Light, a

tailor A tailor is a person who makes or alters clothing, particularly in men's clothing. The Oxford English Dictionary dates the term to the thirteenth century. History Although clothing construction goes back to prehistory, there is evidence of ...

who had established himself as a regional merchant. Light purchased from

Mills Gardner Mills Gardner (January 30, 1830 – February 20, 1910) was an attorney, politician and member of the United States House of Representatives from Ohio from 1877 to 1879. Biography Mills Gardner was born in Russellville, Ohio, the son of Seth G ...

a sizeable

lot Lot or LOT or The Lot or ''similar'' may refer to: Common meanings Areas * Land lot, an area of land * Parking lot, for automobiles *Backlot, in movie production Sets of items *Lot number, in batch production *Lot, a set of goods for sale togethe ...

south of the city's downtown on 10 May 1875, and by the beginning of June, he had commenced the construction of the present house.Owen, Lorrie K., ed. ''Dictionary of Ohio Historic Places''. Vol. 1.

St. Clair Shores St. Clair Shores is a suburban city bordering Lake St. Clair in Macomb County of the U.S. state of Michigan. It forms a part of the Metro Detroit area, and is located about northeast of downtown Detroit. Its population was 59,715 at the 2010 ce ...

: Somerset, 1999, 410-411. Built of brick on a stone

foundation Foundation may refer to: * Foundation (nonprofit), a type of charitable organization ** Foundation (United States law), a type of charitable organization in the U.S. ** Private foundation, a charitable organization that, while serving a good cause ...

and covered with a

slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...

roof,,

Ohio Historical Society Ohio History Connection, formerly The Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society and Ohio Historical Society, is a nonprofit organization incorporated in 1885. Headquartered at the Ohio History Center in Columbus, Ohio, Ohio History Connect ...

, 2007. Accessed 2013-05-25. the L-shaped house is a distinctive example of the Italianate style. Among its prominent architectural components are the shallow

hip roof A hip roof, hip-roof or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downwards to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope (although a tented roof by definition is a hipped roof with steeply pitched slopes rising to a peak). Thus, ...

, the front porch and its handcarven support beams, the shutters and

pediment Pediments are gables, usually of a triangular shape. Pediments are placed above the horizontal structure of the lintel, or entablature, if supported by columns. Pediments can contain an overdoor and are usually topped by hood moulds. A pedimen ...

s of the windows, and the

brackets A bracket is either of two tall fore- or back-facing punctuation marks commonly used to isolate a segment of text or data from its surroundings. Typically deployed in symmetric pairs, an individual bracket may be identified as a 'left' or 'r ...

supporting the

cornice In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a ...

. Particularly significant are the porch supports, which demonstrate the extent to which local woodcarving had progressed during the nineteenth century. After sixty-one years of ownership, Jacob Light's family sold the house in 1936. Later owners preserved the house with few changes; more than fifty years later, it remained a good example of the Italianate style, of which just twenty other houses remained in the city by the late 1980s. In early 1988, the house was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

, qualifying because of its historically significant architecture.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Light, Jacob, House Houses completed in 1875 Buildings and structures in Fayette County, Ohio Italianate architecture in Ohio National Register of Historic Places in Fayette County, Ohio Washington Court House, Ohio 1875 establishments in Ohio