If you are versed in
Linfield College Athletics lore, you know the importance of Henry Lever
(1883-1980 at age 96). (His photo from 1938 Linfield Oak Leaves yearbook.)
Lever Street (see
street sign photo) on campus (running behind Memorial Stadium at Maxwell
Field/Catdome) is named for him. And, in 1998 he was in the first “class” to be
enshrined in the Linfield Athletics Hall of Fame (see photo of his Hall of Fame
electronic tribute).
The year, 1930, Lever
came to Linfield as coach of all sports (football, basketball, baseball, track
& field) and athletic director was the start of Linfield Athletics as we
know it today.
During his years,
1930-1949, at Linfield he coached/guided hundreds of Wildcat athletes and
positively influenced them and others – athletes, coaches, faculty, staff,
family and friends -- on or off the field, court or track.
Among the many
Linfield students he coached were Paul Durham and Roy Helser.
He later hired Durham
as Linfield football coach. That done, Lever served as athletic director one
more school year and then turned the program over to Durham.
Among Durham’s hires as
athletic director was Helser, who went on to coach baseball (head coach),
basketball (co-head and head coach) and football (assistant coach) at the
college. Later, Helser became Linfield athletic director.
Henry Lever was born
in Loveland, Ohio, near Cincinnati, Oct. 4, 1883.
According to his
biography, “He survived a near fatal burst appendix at age 15 with a
life-saving operation on the kitchen table of his family's farm home.”
Read Henry Lever’s
biography here:
Now (this was written
in 2018) a light is shining on that very Lever family farm home, Henry Lever’s
birthplace.
Brad Searcy and his
family bought the Lever family farm home in Loveland in late May 2018. “We are
still unpacking boxes,” Searcy told Wildcatville in August 2018.
(Note: The Lever
family name was originally spelled “Leever.” This explains the use of
Leever/Lever in following text.)
“I have had a general
curiosity about who built it and what types of people lived here, and the old
maps and the Wildcatville biography of Henry Lever really got me going on this
project,” he said.
“The house is
described as a 'farmhouse' but the 'farm' would have been fairly small
according to the old maps, so I have wondered what the people here actually did
for a living.
“The yard is really in
rough condition with lots of big roots so I suspect that it has been relatively
untouched for the most part,” said Searcy.
“My son and I used a
metal detector in the back yard on Sunday to look for 'clues' to the former
residents and immediately found a few items. Nothing of value but a couple of
very old iron pieces.
“The house has some
interesting characteristics such as a relatively large dining room with a high
ceiling and two large bedrooms upstairs, but the kitchen has very low ceilings
with a tiny bedroom (with a separate very worn wooden stairway) above.
“When I looked in the
crawlspace, the kitchen (in back of the house, not visible in the photos) has different
floor joists which look more like logs than cut lumber, so I have wondered if
the kitchen is actually older than the rest of the house rather than an
addition as we originally expected.
There are some very large, old trees in back of the house which I am
sure were present when the house was built and during the Leever/Lever time.
“Ultimately I wanted
to build a timeline of all of the former owners. I have good evidence about the Leevers/Levers
and some info about the late 1960s-early 1970s, plus assessor data from
1979-present. Not sure how long the Levers/Levers
stayed here. Believe I stumbled upon a census record or something that implied
that they moved to another part of Loveland by 1920. But I might be wrong on this. By that time, I
believe that Henry Lever was already out of the house.”
::::::::::::
Included with this
posting are two photos taken in July 2018 by Brad Searcy of the Leever/Lever
house in Loveland, Ohio.
In addition, there are
pieces of old maps he found online.
“Our (Leever/Lever house
was built in 1875 according to the assessor's records but the previous owner
claimed that is was closer to 1860 (no proof of this that I know of),” Searcy
said.
Following are links provided
by Searcy:
--1891 map of Henry
Lever's boyhood house, now home of Searcy family. It’s at 6278 Branch Hill
Guinea Road in Loveland, Ohio. He included a cropped and enlarged map of the
area.
“You will see ‘Thos.
Leever’ as the property owner. He was Henry's father, according to the
"findagrave" links below and other online sources,” Brad Searcy said.
“The square by Thos.
(Thomas) Lever is the (Searcy) house.
“There is also a ‘Henry
W. Leever’ nearby on the map. This must have been Henry's grandfather as it was
also there in a 1870 map (before Henry Lever was born). Also, the family name
was originally spelled "Leever" as you can see but Thomas changed it
to "Lever" at some point after his marriage (I read about this
somewhere)”:
--From Atlas of Clermont County, Ohio, from actual
surveys, digital.cincinattilibrary.org
--1870 map of the same
area, showing a square that "could" be Searcy house, but showing as
property of "HW Leever". Henry Lever was not born yet, and his father
Thomas probably wasn't old enough to have his own house:
--From Atlas of
Clermont County, Ohio, from actual surveys, digital.cincinattilibrary.org
--Henry Lever Wikipedia page:
--Another article of interest about Henry Lever:
--Information about grave of Thomas Lever, father
of Henry Lever:
--Information about grave of Henry Lever:
Brad Searcy
said “there is some info online including a photo of our house in a book about
Morgan's Raid, a Confederate army raid through this area in which Henry W.
Leever (Henry's grandfather) lost a $7 saddle to the raiders. However, I do not
believe it was actually taken from what is now the Searcy property, but rather
from Henry's grandfather, formerly across the street.”
#
