{"nrhp_refnum":"87001213","name":"Batavia House","other_names":["James Thompson Inn","Century Inn"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"14979 S. State St.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Middlefield","county":"Geauga County","state":"OH","lat":41.46101502400006,"lon":-81.07250039799999,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1987-07-16","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Exploration/Settlement"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"Batavia House is a two-story frame inn at 14979 South State Street (S.R. 608) in Middlefield, Geauga County, Ohio, built in 1818 by village co-founder James Thompson. It is the oldest surviving building in the village.","why_significant":"The nomination presents it as the best representative of Middlefield's early settlement period. Thompson's inn, midway between Painesville and Warren on the state road, became a noted overnight stop and a site for business meetings and township elections. It operated as an inn into the twentieth century and remains the village's oldest standing building.","narrative":"Built in 1818 on South State Street in Middlefield, Ohio, Batavia House is the oldest surviving building in the village. James Thompson, a co-founder of the settlement, constructed this symmetrical five-bay, two-story frame inn in the late Federal style, with a one-story kitchen wing at the rear. It has clapboard siding, a gable roof, and a central chimney. Later changes include two-over-two windows, a mid-nineteenth-century porch, and a cinder block rear addition that is hidden from the street by the sloping lot. The inn stood midway between Painesville and Warren on the state road, making it a noted overnight stop and a place for business meetings and township elections. Thompson ran it until the late 1830s and lived there until his death in 1877. His descendants kept it going until 1907, and it then operated as the Century Inn until 1951. Today it houses the Middlefield Historical Society.","period_of_significance":"1818-circa 1840","architect_builder":"Unknown (built by James Thompson)","architectural_style":"Federal","criteria":[],"status_note":"Presently used as the headquarters of the Middlefield Historical Society.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:53:14.956318-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_OH/87001213.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/87001213/e1e5fbdd69-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/87001213/e1e5fbdd69-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"LeeG7144","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Batavia_House_2.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">LeeG7144</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Batavia_House_2.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/71988689","wikipedia":null,"wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138340151"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/ohio/geauga-county/batavia-house-87001213/"}