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  Treasures Of Township History Abound At Historic Detchon Home  
  January 1-7 2015 Edition:   March 29, 2024 Edition  
Albert Eyster Homestead
     Situated in Boardman Park is the historic Oswald Detchon home, named after one of the first 27 families to move to Boardman more than 200 years ago.
      The home was formerly located near Southern Blvd. on Rt. 224 and was moved to Boardman Park in 1985, and now serves as home to a significant collection of local history, collected by the Boardman Historical Society members Don and Patsy Ann Zabel over the past 50 years.
      “We want people to know the about the collection, and we are open for tours at anytime throughout the year,” Don Zabel said this week, adding he and his wife both like history and “preserving it.”
      At the age of 40, Oswald Detchon, a native of England, came to Boardman in 1801, among 27 families that settled here that year. He owned 800 acres of land in Boardman, and by 1803, old records show he was the second-largest taxpayer in the township, paying annual taxes of $1.30.
      Among the most prominent members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, its early meetings were held in a log schoolhouse on Detchon’s farm (roughly located on the northeast corner of Rt. 224 and Southern Blvd.) before the first church edifice was erected about 1835.
      Detchon died in 1836 in Boardman at the age of 75, and many years later, Judge Harold Doyle and his new wife called the Detchon home ‘their home” for several years.
      Detchon was a noted tanner and was among the early caretakers of Boardman Cemetery. He was known for paying good prices for hides and pelts.
      In 1984, a car dealership (Ford) bought the old Detchon property and the Boardman Rotary Club provided the funding to move the home to the historic village in the park, where it now sits (along with Olde St. James Meeting House and the Schiller-Chuey Summer Kitchen House).
      Among the thousands of historical items in the museum are old tools, photographs, Boardman High School yearbooks, clothing, furniture, documents, knick-knacks and other items commonly used in the past. There’s a couch, old manual typewriters, a wall tapestry and hundreds of photographs, including a photo of the 1964-65 Boardman High School basketball team that reached the Final Four.
      “Former Boardman coach Dick Selby donated that photograph of the basketball team,” Party Ann Zabel recalls.
      There is one artifact of Boardman’s history that is missing from the Oswald Detchon home. That is a rock, said to be engraved with the initials ‘E.B.’ History recalls the rock was placed at Boardman Center when the founder of the township, Elijah Boardman, first settled here in 1978. It had been in possession of Boardman Park until about 50 years ago when Ivor Jenkins retired as park superintendent.
      “Artifacts at the Detchon home have been donated to us,” Don Zabel says, adding “usually when a family member dies.” Key donors to the museum include the Zabels, Howard and Bernice Simon (whose family owned a large farm on Indianola Rd., near the present day Robinwood Lane Elementary School), and Roberta Ramsey.
      “Without them, and the efforts of the Boardman Rotary Club, I don’t know where were would have all of these displays,” Patsy Ann Zabel noted.
      The home is open for tours, by appointment, that can be arranged by calling the park offices at 330-726-8105.
      Picture: THE ALBERT EYSTER HOMESTEAD used to be located along what is now Market St. at Sciota Ave. The home in this picture was built between 1880 and 1890. Pictured in the wagon is Albert Eyster, who was known for hauling coal and lumber in the wagon. Tis picture is among the many in the Oswald Det-chon Home at Boardman Park. (More pictures in the Jan 1-7 2015 edition).
 
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