South Zanesville

How South Zanesville began

South Zanesville sits on the Muskingum River at the mouth of Moxahala Creek, immediately south of Zanesville, and is by its own village history the only town in Muskingum County founded after the pioneer era: it was platted and christened on May 8, 1890, when William J. Finley bought the old Merriam and Mattingly farms, secured a railroad right-of-way, and laid the remaining land out as an industrial village advertised as offering 'all the city's advantages, none of its inconveniences.' Cornfields in early 1890 held more than thirty factory and house buildings within a year, drawing sewer-pipe, wagon, bentwood and pottery works to a site promoters boasted was served by five railroads. The village twice escaped annexation to Zanesville, in 1908 and 1930, and built its own waterworks, filtration plant and fire department across the twentieth century.

Settled 1826 (Cyrus Merriam buys the 500-acre farm on which the village's southern part is later built), platted 1890, incorporated christened South Zanesville, May 8, 1890, by William J. Finley, manager of the South Zanesville Land Company.

Where the name comes from

Named simply for its position immediately south of Zanesville, across the Muskingum River and Moxahala Creek from the older city. Cyrus Merriam, who bought the farm the village's southern section was later built on, had himself named his land 'Shawnee farm' in the 1820s, reportedly for Native hunting once carried on there, but that name did not carry forward to the platted village.

Before the town

No Native village, mound, trail or treaty line specific to the ground that became South Zanesville was found in the sources reviewed. The one link to Native history on record is indirect and secondhand: Cyrus Merriam, the Vermont migrant who bought the 500-acre farm here in 1826, named his property 'Shawnee farm,' which the village's own history says was likely a reference to Shawnee people having hunted the area -- a naming choice, not a documented site or settlement, and recorded well after the fact. No source gives a location, date or other detail for that hunting use. The Wakatomika Shawnee towns stood a few miles north at Dresden.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee.

Timeline

1. 1826 — Cyrus Merriam, who had migrated from Vermont with little money, buys a 500-acre tract he names 'Shawnee farm'; he later runs a store and an Underground Railroad station there. His wife, Katherine Tupper, is a granddaughter of General Rufus Putnam, founder of Marietta.
2. 1889 — The C.S. and H. railroad (later the New York Central) seeks a right-of-way through local farms and initially fails to secure it.
3. 1890-05-08 — William J. Finley, having bought the Merriam and Mattingly farms and secured the railroad right-of-way, plats the remaining land and the settlement is officially christened South Zanesville.
4. 1890-11 — The South Zanesville Sewer Pipe and Brick Company is incorporated, one of the village's first manufacturing enterprises.
5. 1890-12 — The South Zanesville Wagon Works is founded; by December the tract that had been cornfields that January is described as a developing community of homes and factories.
6. 1891 — More than thirty buildings are completed in the new village.
7. 1906 — The Southeastern interurban railway begins operating, raising property values and improving access to Zanesville.
8. 1908 — A Zanesville newspaper urges annexing South Zanesville to the city, but nothing is done; a stronger push in 1930 is turned back by anti-annexation organizers.
9. 1924 — The Southeastern interurban line ceases operation following a strike, leaving the village dependent on automobiles and bus service.
10. 1937 — South Zanesville establishes its own volunteer fire department.
11. 1938-1939 — The village builds its own waterworks.
12. 1955 — A filtration plant is added to the village water system.
13. 1950 — Population reaches 1,477, roughly its twentieth-century peak growth period.

Stories

A village platted in a season

Every other town in Muskingum County traces to the pioneer era, but South Zanesville does not: it was built, on purpose, by a land syndicate in 1890. William J. Finley bought up the old Merriam and Mattingly farms south of the Muskingum River, secured the railroad right-of-way the C.S. and H. line had failed to get from individual farmers the year before, platted what was left into village lots, and had the whole thing christened South Zanesville on May 8, 1890. The South Zanesville Land Company's promoters sold it hard, boasting that five distinct railroads -- the Cincinnati and Muskingum Valley, the Columbus, Shawnee and Hocking, and the Zanesville Terminal among them -- converged on the site, and advertising 'all the city's advantages, none of its inconveniences': low taxes, cheap industrial land, easy shipping. It worked. Ground that had been cornfields in January 1890 held more than thirty new buildings by the end of 1891, including a sewer-pipe and brick works, a wagon works, a bentwood factory and pottery makers, and by 1892 the village's own boosters were describing its 'industrial hum, energy and force.'

Shawnee farm

Long before the land companies arrived, the ground that became South Zanesville's southern half belonged to Cyrus Merriam, who had walked west from Vermont with almost nothing and saved enough, working as a laborer, to buy a 500-acre tract in 1826. He called it 'Shawnee farm,' a name the village's own historical account says most likely recalled Native people hunting there, though no further detail survives about who or when. Merriam ran a store on the property and, in the years before the Civil War, an Underground Railroad station -- a fact that sits alongside his wife Katherine Tupper's family history as a granddaughter of Rufus Putnam, the Revolutionary War general who founded Marietta, Ohio's first permanent American settlement. When Finley bought the farm out from under Merriam's descendants more than sixty years later, the Shawnee-farm name did not survive onto the new town's street signs.

Local history sources: villageofsouthzanesville.com · en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org · commons.wikimedia.org

Wells in the eastern floodplain of the Muskingum River along Lewis Drive/SR 666 (Riverside Park well field, reportedly in use since about 1917), adjacent to the treatment plant on Buckeye Drive The water here

• Zanesville68% of residentsMuskingum River valley aquifer (wells)
• Muskingum County Water - Se20% of residentsMuskingum River buried valley aquifer (wells near Duncan Falls)
• South Zanesville6% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Maysville Regional Water5% of residentsMuskingum River buried valley aquifer (wells near Duncan Falls)
• Greenlawn Estates MHP1% of residentsMuskingum River buried valley aquifer (wells near Duncan Falls)

Fire and EMS stations (1)

Police stations (1)

Spills reported since 2021 (1)

Who holds office

Roster as of 2019: county board of elections.

Money issues on the ballot since 2018: 1 of 2 passed.

Ballot issues

Auditor of State record

• No fiscal caution, watch or emergency on the Auditor of State's lists.
• Agreed Upon Procedures, 2023 to 2024, released 2025-12-09

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.

Cite this page