Bolivar, OH

Bolivar sits at the northern tip of Tuscarawas County along the Tuscarawas River, where the Ohio & Erie Canal Towpath runs through the village. Settlement began in 1825 and the village was platted in 1830; the canal turned Bolivar into a grain-shipping point, with wagons lining up to unload at a local mill. Railroads eventually displaced canal traffic, but the old mill still stands on Canal Street and the towpath now carries walkers and cyclists through the same corridor.

The area's older story reaches back to Shingas Town, a Delaware settlement established near present-day Bolivar in 1752. In 1778, the Continental Army built Fort Laurens on the riverbank as a frontier outpost. The fort was abandoned the next year, but its outline, museum, Tomb of the Unknown Patriot, and daylight-open grounds remain just outside town; Ohio's only Revolutionary War fort site also sits beside the towpath. Add the village's library branch and Canal-era buildings, and Bolivar becomes a place where the river, the old water route, and a very specific piece of Ohio military history all meet.