06/04/2026
Hocking County's Falls-Gore Township was the first railroad entry point into the Little Cities of Black Diamonds Region. This was from Logan via the Columbus & Hocking Valley Railroad (later known as the Hocking Valley Railroad) New Straitsville Branch Line. You can follow the branch line along this map through Webb Station (Webb Summit), Gore, Burgessville, Hamlin, and Oreville.
Thanks to the HOCKING COUNTY HISTORICAL AND GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY AND MUSEUM for this great post on Falls-Gore Township!
FALLS-GORE TOWNSHIP BACKGROUND
Compiled by Clinton Poling – a condensed version as presented to the Hocking County Historical Society. From the Logan Daily News, December 10, 1968
Falls-Gore Twp. is six miles long and two miles wide and is bounded on the north by Monday Creek Twp., Perry County; on the east by Coal Twp., Perry County; on the south by Green Twp., and on the west by Marion Twp.
The land came from Perry County in 1818 when Hocking County was organized. In 1823, Green Twp. was cut off Falls Twp. Falls-Gore had been a part of Green Twp. On March 4, 1828, by a petition of the voters, the township came back to Falls. It has no separate government – the east half votes at Gore and the west half at Logan.
The area is drained by Oldtown, Monday, Little Monday and Scrub Monday creeks. Some of the earliest settlers were Webb, Starr, Burgess, Howdyshell, Glaize, Rhodes, Poling, Tucker, Terrell, Bright, Donaldson and Dickens.
Webb’s Chapel Church was organized in 1818 by the Rev. Ben Webb in his home, where services were first held. Then a log cabin was built for services. In 1851, a frame church, 36 x 40 feet, was built and in 1896 the present Church was built. The Gore EUB Church was organized in 1869. The Bethany EUB Church, or Glaize Church as it was commonly known, was organized before 1850. Since the land on which the church was situated was on the Glaize family farm, the church was named after them.
The Old Gore Methodist Church in early days held its services in a cabin. The church was rebuilt in 1868 and torn down about 1930. A Presbyterian – Baptist Church (reference History of the Hocking Valley, 1883) was organized in Perry County in 1832, moved to Oreville in 1875 and later disbanded. The Oreville EUB Church is now at this site.
The township has four school districts - Winona, Old Gore, New Gore and Webb Summit. The Webb Summit school was abandoned in 1956 and was the last one-room school in Hocking County to close. The school at Winona was abandoned about 1895 and torn down by Abe Inbody who moved it to Webb Summit for a store.
Webb Summit, which was laid out in 1871, had two stores, a post office, a railroad station, two blacksmith shops, a handle factory, freight yard and slaughterhouse.
Winona Furnace was located at the junction of Route 93 and Rt. 668 (Scrub and Little Monday creeks). It was situated around Winona Furnace, which was built in 1877 by the Winona Iron Co., with E.B. Green as manager. He was also postmaster of the town of Winona Furnace, which contained 33 company dwellings, a store, telegraph office and railroad station. The population was 150.
Old Gore was not regularly laid out town. It was settled in 1852 by Gromwell B. Culver, who built a store at the time. A school was built there in 1851 and the post office opened in 1852 with Mr. Culver the first postmaster. The post office was moved to Hamlin in 1883.
In the town of New Gore, the north side was originally known as Hamlin and the south side as Burgessville. Burgessville was laid out in January 1871, buy Col. Levi Davis for Henson Burges. Hamlin was laid out in February 1871, by W.H. Jenning for the Straitsville & Monday Creek Coal Mining Co. and was named for George F. Hamlin, superintendent. He was present at the time and supervised the layout of the town. These two towns later combined and adopted the name of New Gore. The Gore furnace was built there in 1876 by General Sam Thomas. The furnace used native and lake ore and mined its own coal. It employed 300 men at one time.
The town of Oreville was surveyed and platted in November and December 1872, by James Davis, deputy county surveyor, for William H. Woodruff. It received its name from the ore in the vicinity.
The first mill was built in Section 34 in 1822 by Moses Starr. It was used to ground wheat and corn and was abandoned in 1870. Noah Starr erected a sawmill in 1877 and in 1882 added burrs to grind corn.
Falls-Gore Twp. Also was the scene of a well-known murder which occurred June 22, 1877, on the John Weldon farm, and the murder of Miss Martha Hite in 1903 in the village.
Part 2 – The Nutter Murder Trial.
