Cincinnati/Milford

In the last few years, Downtown Milford/Old Milford has grown significantly. It is now a hub for adults and children to be. For adults, there is a bar, brewery, and a wine bar. For children, there is a candy store and near the river is a playset and some trails. There is also restaurants and stores lined up and down Main Street. This is currently a very hot place to live with some houses selling for over $600,000. It has really grown with new things like the DORA open container laws and new businesses like Little Miami Brewery. It is also very pretty with most of the houses being very old homes that were built centuries ago and being on the Little Miami River. Additionally, it caters to every age group and has everything that someone would need. It has the police station in the heart of town, Kroger, two gas stations, stores, candy store, restaurants, bars/breweries, walking trails and used to have two schools. The businesses here are also small businesses so for most of them, it only has one location. The houses here are very old but the buildings are also very old. Many houses on Main Street have been converted into businesses. While there is very old buildings in this area, there is new developments throughout the city limits.

Milford,Ohio was first established in 1796 by a Revolutionary War veteran named Francis McCormick. A year later, he founded the first Methodist Class in the Northwest Territory. A survey belonging to another Revolutionary War veteran named John Nancarrow in 1788 the Village of Milford was built with his 230 acres. When Nancarrow fell into hard times in 1802, he sold his Milford holdings on December 20, 1802 to Philip Gatch for $92,000. In 1806, Gatch sold 125 acres to Ambrose Ransom who then sold 64.5 acres to John Hagement. John Hagement was one of the permanent settlers and in his first original plat of the village, he named it Hageman's Mills. He started laying out the layout of the town with streets like Water Street, Main Street, and High Street. The first improvement of water power was made in 1803 by Hageman when he erected a small gist mill. The first postmaster and first cooper was Aaron Matson who built their businesses on the southwest corner of main and Garfield in 1807. The first frame house was built on Main Street in 1809. William Embly opened a small distillery near Water Street in 1810. Then in 1811, Stephen Medaris created the second brick house on High Street which is still currently standing. In February 1806, a newspaper wanted to change the name of the town to "Milford" and became a more popular name. Hageman then left the area left in 1811 for Indiana. Around 1815, Hortshorn and Sanders built the mill that then survived most of that century. In 1828 Matthias Kugler bought the mill and finished the unfinished frame structure and created his home, Millcroft. Milford was incorporated on January 23,1836 by an act of the Ohio General Assembly being passed. In 1906, the C. M. & L. Traction Co. laid railroad tracks in the middle of Main Street and it provided service from Cincinnati to Blanchester. There was a flood in 1913 that hit Milford that destroyed the Motsinger-Eveland stable and the funeral home at the bridge. The inauguration of home mail delivery began on 1922 which led to the development of a steel bridge which was completed in 1926. A second bridge was added in 1980 but in 1985, the steel bridge from 1922 was declared unsafe and in 1992 that bridge was removed. In late 2000 a new concrete bridge was created and is still in use today.

There was two buildings that were used for schools in this area. The two schools in Old Milford were Milford South and a little bit off Main Street. It was one of the schools that were in this area and is facing the same fate of demolishment as the other school, Milford Main. was in operation from 1957 to 2004. After 2004, it was used as school offices. It is now being torn down to make a new apartment complex. The new apartment complex will have a very modern look and I personally believe will look very out of place in this area.