The Morristown Historic District is a nationally recognized historic district embracing much of the village of Morristown,

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 ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. Founded along the

National Road The National Road (also known as the Cumberland Road) was the first major improved highway in the United States built by the federal government. Built between 1811 and 1837, the road connected the Potomac and Ohio Rivers and was a main tran ...

, Morristown prospered as long as the road was heavily travelled, but it stagnated after railroads became prominent. Because the community neither died nor prospered, it has retained its mid-nineteenth-century architecture into the present, making it one of the National Road's least-changed settlements. Settled in the early nineteenth century, Morristown prospered after the National Road became its main street in 1826. In its first decades, the village was heavily dependent on the road; during the village's best years, in the 1850s, more than forty National Road-related businesses lined its streets. However, prosperity departed soon afterward: railroads were built through eastern Ohio in the 1850s, supplanting the National Road as the major mode of transportation, and because no railroad served Morristown, it lost most of its commerce. Buildings continued to be erected into the 1870s, but comparatively little construction occurred in later decades. Nevertheless, the village remained, and benign neglect contributed to Morristown's preservation: no other National Road community in eastern Ohio has experienced so few changes since the road's heyday. Part of its significance derives from construction methods. Most buildings are

vernacular A vernacular or vernacular language is in contrast with a "standard language". It refers to the language or dialect that is spoken by people that are inhabiting a particular country or region. The vernacular is typically the native language, n ...

structures built of brick in

Flemish bond Brickwork is masonry produced by a bricklayer, using bricks and mortar. Typically, rows of bricks called ''courses'' are laid on top of one another to build up a structure such as a brick wall. Bricks may be differentiated from blocks by siz ...

, setting Morristown apart from surrounding communities, which possess few historic brick buildings.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 ...

: Somerset, 1999, 63. In early 1980, the Morristown Historic District was declared, with boundaries encompassing ; seventy of the district's eighty-six buildings were rated as

contributing properties In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distri ...

, as was the village cemetery. Limited destruction and limited new construction has left Morristown with nearly all of its mid-19th century

built environment The term built environment refers to human-made conditions and is often used in architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, public health, sociology, and anthropology, among others. These curated spaces provide the setting for human a ...

, enabling the district to qualify for the Register both because of its place in area history and because of its historic architecture.

References

{{National Register of Historic Places in Ohio National Register of Historic Places in Belmont County, Ohio National Road 1980 establishments in Ohio Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Ohio