Cemetery Walk with Adreanne Foos

In our October podcast, Adreanne Foos sat down with us to discuss her cemetery tour. Adreanne has been doing this tour in Newton Falls since 2024. She talked to us about how she picks who to talk about, as well as her research methods. In my favorite part of the podcast, we get to hear a couple of the the stories of those buried in the cemetery, some spooky, some full of history.

The Newton Falls East Side Cemetery was founded in 1813 from land donated by Bildad Hine and Jonathan Jacobs, both of whom are buried in the cemetery. The East Side Cemetery is located on N. Canal Street. The cemetery chapel was built in 1909 and was restored in 1990. The West Side Cemetery was established in 1904 on land that was purchased as an addition and is located on Ridge Rd. A foot bridge was constructed in 1928 connecting the east and west side cemeteries and cost roughly $2000. In June of 2025 the bridge was repainted and dedicated to our veterans. 

East Side Chapel and vault.

Foot bridge connecting the East and West Side cemeteries.

Aerial view: West Side is in the middle and the East side is northeast of the that cemetery.

All those buried in the cemetery have stories, some happy, some sad, some tragic. These are some of the stories of those buried in the cemetery that Adreanne will tell. 

Addison Allen, a well known farmer who lived just west of Newton Falls, had spent a Saturday in 1915 hunting with some friends. He had spent Saturday night in town and drove home that night with his hired man. His hired man got out of the wagon and went into the house thinking Addison would follow. However, as Addison was attempting to alight from the wagon, he fell and broke his neck, and he passed at three o'clock the next morning. For those who have never heard the term "alight", Adreanne lets us know that it is an old-fashioned term meaning to step down or get out of a vehicle, train, or bus. Addison was born in 1859 and was survived by his wife and two small children when he passed. He is buried in the East Side Cemetery in an unmarked grave. 

Colwell T. Porter served on Johnson's Island during the Civil War. The island, in Sandusky, was a prisoner of war camp for Confederate soldiers. In May of 1864, Porter joined the 171st Ohio Volunteer Infantry for 100 days of service. After training, he was sent to Johnson's Island to guard the prisoners. On June 1, 1864, Colwell wrote a letter to his sister describing how easy guard duty was and asked for her to send food from home and a pound of tobacco. He mentioned a failed escape attempt where the prisoner was caught tunnelling out. A week after writing this letter, Colwell and the 171st were sent to Kentucky to help Union troops near Cynthiana. On June 11, 1864, they were attacked by Confederate forces while guarding a railroad bridge. The 171st ended up surrendering after heavy fighting and multiple losses. Colwell was taken to the Soldier's Home in Cleveland the next day. He died there on July 2, 1864, from disease, and was later buried in Newton Falls. 

One of the most tragic stories is the story of Reuben Bostwick. He was a veteran of the French Colonial War. He married his wife Mabel and they had 8 children. In January of 1777, five of his children died mysteriously within a couple of days of each other. Only Reuben and his youngest daughter, Lois, who married one of the men that donated land for the cemetery, Bildad Hine, are buried in Newton Falls. His wife and six of his children are buried in Connecticut where they were originally from. His eldest son is buried in New York. A manuscript was written by Reuben's eldest daughter Electa, describing what happened during the winter of 1776 into 1777. 

https://www.ancestrylibrary.com/imageviewer/collections/62282/images/dvm_genmono000888-00078-1?queryId=a5d6c37b-d5ba-4113-90c7-435362642ef9&usePUB=true&usePUBJs=true&pId=4327878720

Join Adreanne Saturday, October 24th for the third annual Cemetery Walk from 12pm to 1pm. 

Families of Newton Falls

Another family that was important in the Newton Falls community were the Butts/Porter family. The Butts and the Porters were among the early residents of Newton Falls.

After Cornelius DuBois expressed his disapproval of Henry's construction of the DuBois home on the West Bank of the Mahoning River (built between 1832-1834), the home was sold to Horace Stevens, who later sold it to Dr. J.F. Porter. This home became known as the Porter-Butts home. The house was located around the area where the current Dairy Queen sits at 377 West Broad Street. However, the address for the home back then was 200 Charleston Rd.

The home was remodeled between 1880 to 1890, when a back area and porch were added. Rumor has it that the upstairs hallway was wide enough to fit a team of horses. I am unsure of where that rumor started, but it's an interesting one.

J.F. Porter's daughter Edna Porter married Addison Butts in 1875, and they had four daughters: Ethel, Alice, Lillian and Althea.

J.F Porter left the house to his daughter and her husband, who in turn left it to their daughters. According to Alice's obituary, she and Ethel lived at that home from 1900 until their respective deaths, Ethel in 1941 and Alice in 1966. 

J.J, Butts, Alice's grandfather served as mayor of the village for several terms, and her father Addison according to his obituary was one of the civic leaders of the community and held several offices in the town and township.

Alice Butts studied at Kent Normal College, now Kent State University, and taught elementary in both Paris and Braceville Townships before teaching in Newton Falls for 40 years.

After Alice passed away in 1966, she left the house for her nephew Norman Root, son of Althea. He passed away a year later and left the house for his widow, Eva. The house was then rented out for a few years until a routine inspection of rental properties in Newton Falls found that repairs needed to be made for the safety of the renters. Eva and her husband denied the repairs and instead choose to give a 60-day notice to the renters. Many tried to buy the house and move it to be restored, but that fell through. The home was demolished in late 1975.

On Saturday, September 19th, I went to the events in Mantua hosted by Mantua Historical Society and the Mantua Restoration Society as part of Ohio Open Doors. I got there just in time for the dedication of the historic marker which commemorates the Mantua Center Historic Boundary increase.

Next up was a talk about East Lawn Cemetery which featured highlights of several people including Zenas Kent, who was the grandfather of Marvin Kent, the namesake of Kent, Ohio. After the cemetery talk, I headed over to Mantua Center Church to check out a display of quilts. All of this was located at Mantua Center Green which, as we mentioned in our first episode, was laid out how town squares were back in Connecticut since many of the early settlers of the Western Reserve were from there.

Then, just a short drive away up the street, I checked out Mantua Center School where they had refreshments and displays set up of the different classes that went to the school before it was closed down. There was also a book that members of the Mantua Restoration Society put together with newspaper clippings and reports about the school and their efforts to restore it.

I had a great time learning about the history of Mantua, which prior to this I knew very little about, and being able to visit the historic sites.

Families of Newton Falls

Hello Everyone!! My name is Ashley and I am a Reference Associate at Newton Falls Public Library. My friend Kim, who is the Local History Librarian, and I have a podcast about the history of Newton Falls. This blog will be a companion to our podcast Echoes of Newton Falls. 

Let's dive in to our September topic, which is the big families of Newton Falls. 

The DuBois Family is an important family in Newton Falls history. Dr. Henry Augustus DuBois co-founded and laid out the village of Newton Falls. He designed the town layout that would rely on the water power of the falls on the Mahoning River. The DuBois family owned land in the south east portion of Newton Falls. The family only lived in Newton Falls for a short period of time, but while Dr. Henry DuBois was here he built a sawmill, papermill, grist mill and two warehouses. 

The Paper Mill on the East Branch of the Mahoning River was erected by Mr. DuBois on the property owned by him, near the rear of the property, where a spring flowed next to the river bank. Mr Treudly from Virginia moved his paper mill into the building, and continued for an unknown time in the business. The water from the spring was used in the making of the paper. It was carried from the spring to the mill in the box under the water. Only the purest water could be used in making the writing paper. An engine at the mill furnished the power to move the box under the water. The mill was later used as flax mill. In Sept 5, 1907 the mill burned down.

Henry's father Cornelius DuBois purchased property for residence on the west bank of the Mahoning River and asked his son to build a home in 1832. The mansion was completed in 1834. However, Cornelius was not a fan of the house and asked his son to build another home. Construction started in 1838 and was finished in 1842. The site of the new mansion was located between N. Center St, E. Franklin St and Division St. The home was grand and beautiful and in it's prime was "pointed out with pride to visitors, laying claim to being the most famous landmark in this section." The mansion was also looked at with fear in the community. Stories persisted through the 19th and 20th centuries of the mansion being haunted, as well as, stories of the Dr being a mad scientist that lured victims to experiment on them.

The family only lived in the mansion for a decade. In the summer of 1853, the family moved back to Connecticut. The high cost of rent for the house made it hard for anyone to live there, so the mansion lay vacant until 1904. For fifty-one years the house sat in decay, until the B. and O. railroad brought in Italian immigrants to work on the tracks. These men lived in the mansion during this time, and it seems they might not have had permission to stay in the house, but nothing is proven on this. In 1904, the house caught on fire while the men lived there and the fire smoldered for days.

Lyman's Histories and Stories of Newton Falls by Lima Lyman was used for most of the source material. There is a great chapter about the house and the family, in which they explain the grandeur of the mansion and describe in great detail what the mansion looked like. Make sure to check out our podcast, links for the podcast are on our website https://www.newtonfalls.org/ 

https://hub.catalogit.app/newton-falls-public-library?query=dubois