Cahoon Memorial Park – 1818. Joseph Cahoon, wife Lydia and family came to Bay Village, the place that he called, “the most beautiful spot in all of America” in October, 1810. He and his sons built a solid log cabin in four days on the east bank of a creek. By 1818, the family was doing so well that Cahoon and his sons built a large, five-bedroom frame house on the hillside above the creek and overlooking the lake. They cut the lumber at their own sawmill. Doors and window frames were made by hand. Any nails used had to come by wagon 350 miles from Pittsburgh, so they used as few as possible. They cut the boards to fit together perfectly with wooden pegs. Cahoon built the new house to look like a New England farmhouse, like the ones he had grown up in in Connecticut and Vermont.
The house was called “Rose Hill,” named by son Joel’s wife, Margaret Van Allen Cahoon, because of the many rose bushes surrounding it that were planted by Lydia Cahoon. The Cahoons also planted a wisteria tree that has bloomed every spring for more than a century. Today, the Bay Village Historical Society looks after the Cahoon homestead, and maintains it as a museum and library.