Higginsport

How Higginsport began

Higginsport was first platted in 1804 as White Haven, a plan that was abandoned, before Colonel Robert Higgins replatted it with 114 lots on February 28, 1816, and gave it his name. It sits on the Ohio River in Lewis Township and is the village near which George Webb and Joseph Pore discovered White Burley tobacco in 1864, a crop that by 1883 supported seventeen tobacco warehouses shipping roughly two million pounds a year down the river to New Orleans. It was the birthplace of major-league pitcher Harry 'Slim' Sallee, a member of the 1919 Cincinnati Reds.

Platted 1816-02-28, by Colonel Robert Higgins (1816 replatting); earlier platted as White Haven in 1804.

Where the name comes from

Named for Colonel Robert Higgins, who replatted the village with 114 lots in 1816; the site had earlier been platted in 1804 under the name White Haven, a plan that was abandoned.

Before the town

No Native American village, mound or trail specific to Higginsport is recorded. The site lies within the 1795 Treaty of Greenville cession and the Virginia Military District, on the same Ohio River corridor long used by Shawnee and Miami travelers.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee, Miami.

Timeline

1. 1804 — The site is first platted under the name White Haven; the plan is abandoned.
2. 1807 — The first schoolhouse in Higginsport, a log cabin, is built near the later residence of George Love; a log schoolhouse on the public square follows in 1828 and serves also as a meeting-house, and a brick school on Lot 89 about 1845.
3. 1816 — February 28: Colonel Robert Higgins replats the village with 114 lots and it takes his name.
4. 1818 — Higginsport's first church is organized; by 1819 Stephen Colvin finds about half a dozen cabins on the plat, occupied by Col. Higgins, John and James Cochran, Mr. Arbuckle and James Norris, a Black man.
5. 1828 — Sam Pell opens a little store, followed by Nathan Kite, Benjamin Thresher and, in 1832, Jesse Dugan, who builds the first brick house in 1835 at Water and Brown streets.
6. 1829-01-24 — The Higginsport Post Office is established, with the town tailor Mr. Roberts, a Revolutionary veteran, as postmaster.
7. 1849 — Robert Anderson moves his store, begun in 1839, from Water street, where all the business had been done, to Washington street, then a back street.
8. 1858-02 — A tornado sweeps away the township's first brick house, John Boude's of 1817; it is rebuilt on the same spot with the same brick.
9. 1864 — George Webb and Joseph Pore discover White Burley tobacco on the farm of Captain Frederick Kautz in Pleasant Township near Higginsport in the summer of 1864, according to the historical marker; Wikipedia says the tobacco was first grown there in 1864 from seed brought from Kentucky.
10. 1867-10-17 — Higginsport Lodge No. 373, F. & A. M., is granted a dispensation; Higginsport Lodge No. 575, I.O.O.F., is organized June 22, 1874.
11. 1868-03-18 — James Daugherty, a Higginsport Mason, is killed in the explosion of the steamer Magnolia.
12. 1872-10-20 — The German Reformed Church at Higginsport is dedicated by O. F. Accola of Dayton; the Presbyterian church, organized March 18, 1848, had built its brick church in 1853.
13. 1880 — Wikipedia's text puts the 1880 population at 862, but its census table shows 762 in 1880 and 764 in 1890, the highest recorded; by 1883 the tobacco trade supports seventeen warehouses and 32 buyers shipping about two million pounds a year down the Ohio River to New Orleans.
14. 1880 — A school election in the spring approves a $15,000 schoolhouse, ending twelve years of effort to replace the insecure old brick building.
15. 1882 — The village has five general stores, two drug stores, a hardware store, a grist mill and distillery, two hotels (the Pierce House and the Central), five physicians and seventeen tobacco warehouses.
16. 1885 — February 3: Harry 'Slim' Sallee, future major-league pitcher, is born in Higginsport.
17. 1919 — Slim Sallee, pitching for the Cincinnati Reds, goes 21-7 with a 2.06 earned run average and is a member of the Reds team that beats the Chicago White Sox in the 1919 'Black Sox' World Series.
18. 2020 — The census counts 213 people in Higginsport, down from 862 in 1880.

Stories

A tobacco river town's ballplayer

Higginsport was an Ohio River tobacco town in the nineteenth century. The historical marker credits George Webb and Joseph Pore with the discovery of White Burley tobacco in the summer of 1864 on Captain Frederick Kautz's farm near Higginsport, and by 1883, according to Wikipedia, the village had seventeen tobacco warehouses and 32 buyers shipping about two million pounds a year down the Ohio River to New Orleans. Harry Franklin 'Slim' Sallee was born in Higginsport on February 3, 1885. A left-handed pitcher, he played parts of fourteen seasons (1908-1921) for the St. Louis Cardinals, New York Giants and Cincinnati Reds, with a career record of 174-143. In 1919 he went 21-7 with a 2.06 earned run average for the Reds, the best season of his career, and became just the second pitcher up to that time to win more games than he walked in a season. He was a member of the Reds team that won the 1919 World Series against the Chicago White Sox. Sallee died on March 22, 1950, and is buried at Confidence Cemetery in Georgetown, Ohio.

Local history sources: en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org · hmdb.org · touringohio.com · en.wikipedia.org · archive.org

Every historic place in Brown County on the full map

No water-system data is linked to Higginsport's ZIP codes yet.

Fire and EMS stations (1)

Money issues on the ballot since 2021: 1 of 1 passed.

Ballot issues

Elections for office

Winners in bold. Results from the county board of elections' official canvass unless marked.

Auditor of State record

• No fiscal caution, watch or emergency on the Auditor of State's lists.
• Agreed Upon Procedures, 2024 to 2025, released 2026-07-23
• Agreed Upon Procedures, 2022 to 2023, released 2025-02-04

Source: Ohio EPA eDocument portal (edocpub.epa.ohio.gov), indexed 2026-10-14. Facilities are placed on the map from Ohio EPA's own map layers, EPA's Facility Registry, coordinates written in the filings, or a geocoded street address. A permit filed under a private person's name (most are household septic systems) is counted but never named, placed or linked; licenses for individual workers and open-burning notices are left out entirely.

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