Our next glimpse into Geauga history takes us to the southeast corner of the county, opposite the first town in our series, Thompson. Not only are Bainbridge and Thompson opposites by geography, but if you have had the chance to visit both, you know that many more differences exist. Character, layout, land use, population density, wealth, economy, weather – a whole article could be devoted to the comparison alone. But one similarity Bainbridge shares with Geauga’s ‘chimney’ as well as all the townships in the county, is its beginning. You see, no matter how different they are now, they all started with one settler.
For the territory that was to become Bainbridge, Ohio, that settler was David McConoughey. On November 9, 1810, he and his family began the long journey from Blanford, Massachusetts to the Western Reserve. They arrived on New Year’s Day 1811 at a relative’s house in Aurora. It was soon after that David purchased 100 acres of land and went to work building a crude cabin. As described in The Pioneer and General History of Geauga County Ohio, the round log structure was 18 feet by 20 feet with a split log floor, no glass in the windows, and a chimney of sticks and mud. On Thanksgiving Day 1811, the McConoughy family moved into their humble wilderness abode and became the first official settlers of the future township.
As happened in its Geauga counterparts, more families followed suit. The Lacy, Kent, Fowler, Goodsell, Haskins, and Bissell names, among others, set their stakes and began the daunting task of turning virgin forest to farmland. Six years after its wilderness was first broken, with a population of 72, a government was formed and a township born. The new entity was named in honor of one of the heroes of the War of 1812, William Bainbridge. This naval veteran was in command of the USS Constitution, better known to history by her nickname, ‘Old Ironsides’.
As the years passed, the town grew. Several flourishing businesses emerged among the agriculture. Perhaps the most successful and well-known of these businesses had its beginnings along a lake in the township’s southwest corner, then known as Giles Pond. In 1898, a hotel was introduced to the already-popular picnic grounds. A year later, the park got its first ride, a steam-powered carousel, then went on to add a roller rink, a photo booth, a bowling alley, and a pool hall. This was the birth of an amusement park, a local and national legend that would feature the hottest rides (some the first of their kinds in the country), fantastic entertainment, and even share it’s shores with Sea World. Attendance would regularly top one million a season in its glory days.
Somewhere in those early years, the name was changed to the one with which so many associate memories of childhood fun, including this amateur author – Geauga Lake. At the turn of the last century, the landmark went through ownership changes, with the last making many management missteps. Abruptly, in 2007, the amusement park was closed and auctioned off the following summer. Working in the vicinity often takes me past the rotting remnants and acres of barren parking lots. It makes me feel very aged to see the once-crowded and noisy park so still and silent. What I wouldn’t give to ride that old wooden skeleton of the Big Dipper (pictured at the top of this page), my first roller coaster, with my daughter.
The year 1922 would mark a profound change in the character of Bainbridge. The transition had already begun as weary Clevelanders moved east to escape the city life. But in that year, construction of a 250-acre summer home development began. The Lake Lucerne community (pictured above) was centered around a 25-acre lake, and with the introduction of electricity, it rapidly changed into a permanent settlement. Following decades would see the acres of agriculture in the township transformed to hundreds of houses, some of the finest in the county. The once quiet wilderness today serves as an upscale, scenic outlying Cleveland suburb.
Author: Ty Pilarczyk
Ty is the president of the Huntsburg Historical Society, and has lived in Huntsburg most of his life. When he is not designing, installing, and maintaining landscapes for the family construction business, Ty enjoys vegetable gardening, restoring and collecting old pressure lanterns, and spending time with his family.