Mantua Center District (Boundary Increase)

Mantua Center is a small crossroads township center in Portage County, Ohio, grouped around a public common where State Route 82 meets Mantua Center Road. Its five buildings are two churches, a town hall and two houses, nearly all built around 1835-1840. The Christian Church, formed in 1827 after Sidney Rigdon began preaching in Mantua, is described as the oldest Campbellite congregation in Ohio. James A. Garfield was among the visiting pastors from Hiram. The former Methodist church, whose congregation moved to Mantua Village in 1895, later served as a township school annex and since 1968 as a civic center. The town hall is notable for its octagonal cupola with a hemispherical dome, a Greek Revival feature rarely preserved on public buildings. One house began as a store built in 1835 and was later converted to a residence. The district was listed as an intact early nineteenth century township center, valued as a whole more than for any single building.