Holgate Avenue Historic District

Holgate Avenue in Defiance, Ohio, is a river-front residential street of twenty-nine houses and several outbuildings, running from 328 to 716 Holgate Avenue along the Maumee River. The land was once a fifty acre tract owned by William C. Holgate, who built the Greek Revival house at 512 Holgate in 1856 and whose estate was platted in 1872. The houses range from mid-nineteenth century to the early twentieth century and include Italianate, Second Empire, Queen Anne, Shingle, Dutch Colonial Revival, Prairie and Craftsman/Bungalow examples. Large lots, deep setbacks, mature trees and a former deer park at 513 Holgate give the street a boulevard-like openness. Long back lots slope to the river and keep remnant Osage Orange and Hackberry hedgerows from earlier pasture use. Directory records show that merchants, bankers, manufacturers and professionals lived here in the 1890s. The district is significant for its link to Holgate, its architecture and its landscape, over a period from 1844 to 1930.