Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Photo: Joseph Elliott · Public domainMore historic than 47% of U.S. towns. What drives it
Its Register listing is the Zoarville Bridge. Most of Fairfield Township was built recently: 7% of its homes predate 1940 and the median home dates from 1998. Below: 1 old photo or paper, maps from 1912 on, and old-book passages.
More historic than 47% of U.S. towns, on its age, its old homes and the National Register.
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Fairfield Township is more historic than 47% of U.S. towns. Its National Register listings hold the grade up; its share of homes from before 1940 pulls it down.
Ohio towns list about as much on the Register as the country (a typical Ohio town has 2.9 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Fairfield Township’s 5.5 sits above most of its state (65% of Ohio towns have fewer) while its 1 listings outnumber those of 51% of U.S. towns.
Founding year: our sources. Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Fairfield Township’s history is told.
Another post office, Tabor, opened and closed inside today’s town.
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Fairfield Township. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Fairfield Township.
Wikipedia doesn’t have a history of Fairfield Township yet. The photos, dates and memories neighbors add here are how it gets written.
Fairfield Township is one of the twenty-two townships of Tuscarawas County, Ohio, United States. The 2020 census found 1,509 people in the township.
Its population held steady between the last two censuses: 1,505 in 2010, 1,509 in 2020.
Intro from Wikipedia. Population: U.S. Census Bureau.
Passages that mention Fairfield Township, cut from the printed page as they were published.
October, 1882, laid out a village plat of twenty-eight lots, and called it Valley City. The original plat is partly in Sandy and partly in Fairfield Township. An addition of thirteen lots in Sandy Township was made in March, 1883. A Bmall grocery and several dwellings compose the village.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
The Jennings, Amos, Lewis and Bayless families were among the foremost pioneers of the township. Amos came with his father, Augustus, to the county in 1807, and in 1809 settled in Wayne Township. The Jennings first settled in what is now Fairfield Township. Jacob Steffe, a German Lutheran from Maryland, emigrated to Holmes County, and shortly afterward, in 1814, caipe to Wayne Township and settled on Lot 12, about a mile south of Dundee.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
One decade in the archive so far: the 1910s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
2016Model (not functioning) Porta Potties, or movable toi…
2016A full-sized model Amish horse and buggy above superm…
2016This is neither a zoo nor a water park, but it's Jung…
2016This is neither a zoo nor a water park, but it's Jung…
2016This is neither a zoo nor a water park, but it's Jung…
2016Even the grocery aisles have personality at Jungle Ji…
2015Map of Tuscarawas County Ohio Highlighting Fairfield …Map
2007OHMap-doton-SomerdaleNo then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Fairfield Township’s page.
Retake this view · +15The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
Nobody well known was born in Fairfield Township itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
Fairfield Township is more historic than 47% of U.S. towns. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
One place: the Zoarville Bridge (listed 1997).
7% of Fairfield Township’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±6.6 points), against a typical 15% for an Ohio town; the median home was built in 1998.
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
From Wikimedia Commons (2), the Library of Congress (7), the National Register of Historic Places (1), U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
