Lancaster Historic District

Lancaster Historic District covers about 155 acres of the Ohio county seat, taking in most of the town that John and Noah Zane laid out in 1800 and the neighborhoods that grew to the east in the later 19th century. It combines the downtown business core, the Square 13 area with some of central Ohio's finest early houses, and modest residential streets, churches, schools and former industrial buildings. Landmarks include the Richardsonian Romanesque City Hall, completed in 1898, the Italianate courthouse, Federal houses built by Daniel Sifford, and the home of Thomas Ewing. The nomination argues that nearly every major American style from the early 1800s to the 1930s appears here, held together by hilly topography, street trees, stone walls and iron fences. It also points to Lancaster's role on Zane's Trace, its canals and its railroads. Most of the area is protected by local design review.