{"nrhp_refnum":"75001515","name":"Old School Privy","other_names":["The Little Building","Camper Elementary Incinerator"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"310 Main St.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Genoa","county":"Ottawa County","state":"OH","lat":41.515053684000065,"lon":-83.35940122799997,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1975-07-31","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Transportation","Education"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A small brick and stone school privy at 310 Main Street in Genoa, Ottawa County, Ohio, behind Camper Elementary. It served the first brick school, built in 1870, and was designed in the Romanesque Revival style.","why_significant":"The nomination calls it the largest and most elegant privy in the county, if not the region, to survive. Its quality design reflects the early civic pride of Genoa, incorporated in 1868, which also showed in the Grist Mill of 1872 and the Town Hall of 1885. It is also described as one of the small comfort stations once common across the Northwest Territory.","narrative":"Behind Camper Elementary on Main Street in Genoa, Ohio, stands a small brick outbuilding that once served as the privy for the town's first brick school, built in 1870. Despite its humble purpose, it was designed in the Romanesque Revival style, with round-arched openings, local soft orange brick and rusticated stone trim used for the water table, steps, thresholds, sills and door arches. The rectangular plan holds four separate toilet rooms, two for students and two for faculty, each with its own door. Both gable ends have two five-panel doors with fanlight transoms, and a false chimney balances the working one that vented a pot-belly stove. It was recognized as the largest and most elegant privy in the county, and possibly the region, to survive. Its careful design reflects the civic pride of a village incorporated in 1868, which also built a grist mill in 1872 and a town hall in 1885. Restoration as a bikeway rest stop was planned.","period_of_significance":null,"architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":"Romanesque Revival (late Victorian); listed in the data sheet as vernacular","criteria":[],"status_note":"The data sheet lists the building as not in use. Restoration was planned by the Genoa Area Bicentennial Commission for use as a rest stop on a bikeway.","vacant_flag":true,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:53:09.674743-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_OH/75001515.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/75001515/6a49a64c77-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/75001515/6a49a64c77-1600.webp","licence":"Public domain","author":"Nyttend","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Old_School_Privy.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Nyttend</a>, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Old_School_Privy.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/71990845","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_School_Privy","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7084934"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/ohio/ottawa-county/old-school-privy-75001515/"}