Fairborn Historical Society meeting scheduled

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Greene County News Report

FAIRBORN – The Fairborn Historical Society will have its inaugural meeting beginning 6:30 p.m. Aug. 31 at the Fairborn Library. It asks citizens to join, and share stories and memories. Attendees can also bring photographs or items of interest to show and talk about.

The Fairborn Historical Society was organized to preserve Fairborn’s unique history. It is the only town in the world named Fairborn, a name that comes from the merging of two towns in 1950.

Fairfield grew up from a small pioneer settlement built in the late 1700s on the Old Cumberland Trail (present-day Broad Street, or 444). Its first house was a two-story log home that is today part of a Fairborn park: the Mercer-Smith house. The other half of Fairborn, Osborn, sprang up in 1850 around a railroad line that had just come through the area. Osborn, which sat about where the Skyborn Theater is today, became a thriving, bustling town. The two towns would probably never have merged if not for the 1913 flood that devastated downtown Dayton.

The Aug. 31 meeting will begin with a short video, Ohio Town On The Move: The Osborn Story 1913-1950. Wright State Student Matthew Peek produced the video in 2010 as part of his graduate studies in public history. It is the story of how Osborn, even though it survived the Great Dayton Flood unscathed, was declared part of the flood plain behind Huffman Dam. As a result, Osborn was condemned. But instead of allowing it to be destroyed, the citizens put the town on wheels and moved it.

Attendees can see how Osborn managed to survive, as well as share stories and memories. It will take place in the meeting room in the library basement.

Greene County News Report compiled by Whitney Vickers.

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