Temperance Hall

 

This is a photo of the Baptist Ladies Hall in the early 1900's, situated at Section 8 Lot 5 in Medina Village.  In the early 1840's this building was known as Temperance Hall and owned by E. C. Coats, village tailor--full name Elisha Coats. See the location on the 1864 map below.  Keep in mind that the Red Brick Store had not yet been built at Section 8 Lot 8, and there was an earlier, smaller business building there at that time of this map.  Temperance Hall at Sec 8 L 5 is shown in RED while the other lots are shown in BLUE.  See the next photo below with Lot numbers above the buildings.  That is another early 1900's photo, so the buildings are slightly different than in the map.  I used this map as it's the only one with both building symbols AND lot numbers.

The link to the entire 1864 map above is available at the "Maps" tab on this website.

In the property tax records at Lenawee Museum, the earliest recorded owner of Section 8 Lot 5 that I could find is E.C. Coats.  That is in 1844 and there is a notation that it is "Temperance Hall."  

Now for the discussion of this building:  Joyce Longo devotes a page to it in her Historic Calendar, see the tab for it on this website, go to the month of August.  Joyce believed that this building was once the original Baptist Church--but that was before seeing the property records research.  Also, we discussed the possibility because of the bell on top, and also before we knew the existence of any "Temperance Hall," which is is referred to many times in the property records from 1844 onward past 1860.  Joyce admitted to me that this could be incorrect, but she went with the information she had at the time.

Annis Darr called this building the Baptist Ladies Hall (the photo post card is labeled Ladies Hall at the bottom) and it was used for suppers and bazaars for many years.  In Annis Darr's HANDWRITTEN history notebook at Hudson Museum, I later saw reference to the bell being added after the Oak Grove Academy closed--this was the original Academy bell.  That was in the early 1890's.  

Annis' typed history also says Baptist Ladies Hall was once the Masonic Hall; and also that after John Christopher died in 1895, his brick store closed and was sold to the Masons.  So that was around the same time the Academy closed and became a Grange Hall.

I have never seen reference to the location of the original village school and church, that is the church prior to 1846 that was when the present main section was built--until I read the website of Medina Federated Church which claims the school and church shared a building in the beginning.  Now Mr. Ron Hauter donated on behalf of Medina Township the early Township record books, including the school records to Hudson Museum.  I looked all through the District 2 book that was for Medina village and I was unable to see a definitive location.  There was reference to a small dwelling next to the original frame school--and the frame buildings were sold and hauled away AROUND THE TIME OF the building of the brick school in 1872.  I don't recall what happened to the small dwelling, but the school building was hauled across from the "House on the Hill" on Warwick Rd., according to Annis Darr.  There were several dwellings on west Eagle St. north of the school that no longer exist.  

In addition, I believe that I've seen a property tax reference to a "Village Lot" owned at an early time by one of the Daniels brothers on the west side where the school lot was.  It never said for church or school, but I suppose it COULD have been what was meant by Village Lot.

Therefore, I believe the original church and school shared a small frame building on Warner St. near the corner of Eagle St. where only an old garage exists today.  I doubt that Joyce Longo would disagree and I do not wish to diminish in any way her very interesting Historical Medina Calendar.

Mr. Ron Hauter also has recently donated to Hudson Museum a CHAIR decorated with the writing "Sons of T" which I believe to refer to Sons of Temperance, probably a group that met at Temperance Hall.  If anyone has any additional information, please leave a comment.below.

See Hudson Museum public Facebook for a photo of this excellent example of a Sons of Temperance chair.  

In 1856 Medina men formed the Medina Thief Detecting Society with officers John G. Smith (brother-in-law of G. W. Moore who lived on the farm to the west of Moore on Medina Rd.) and Charles Brown (Proprietor of Old White Store after E.D. and John Allen moved to Morenci).  The meetings of the society were held at Temperance Hall as laid out in the introduction to their constitution and bylaws as shown below.

We are indebted to the Lenawee County Historical Society for access to this document from our past.  I failed to scan any more of this document but the rules for the society are laid out in the pamphlet.  It was printed by A. E. Allen, apparently Augustus Allen, son of Erasmus Darwin Allen, the first publisher of the Observer in Morenci (called the New Era in 1872).  For this history see State Line Observer of Morenci under Morenci History Part 2.  We are also indebted to the State Line Observer for access to their excellent historical online archives created by publisher David Green.