December 10, 1819, Allen Woods appeared before Henry
Chapman, a Justice of the Peace in and for Brown County, and acknowledged a
plat of Georgetown, containing twenty-two lots and two outlots, including nine
acres and forty-two poles, located on a part of Robert Lawson's Survey, No.
523, and described as follows on the record: "The land contained in the
above plat begins at a post near a white oak; thence west sixty-five poles to a
walnut post; thence north twenty-two poles and eight-tenths to a walnut post;
thence east sixty-five poles to a walnut stake, near a branch; thence south
twenty-two poles and eight-tenths to the place of beginning." Main Street,
running north and south, was three poles wide and twenty-two and eight-tenths
long; Apple Street, same length, two poles wide; North Street, one and
eight-tenths poles wide; twelve long; Main Alley, one pole wide and eight long.
Albert Woods, a native of
Ireland,
came to
America
when small, and located in the State of
Pennsylvania.
Upon arriving at maturity, he was married in that State, and removed to
Georgetown,
Ky., where he resided several years. Soon
after
Ohio was admitted into the
Union,
he came to it and located on the site of
Georgetown;
this was probably in 1803 or 1804. His son, Albert Woods, Jr., now a retired
physician of
ClermontCounty,
was born here in October, 1805, and a daughter, now the wife of Peter L.
Wilson, Esq., was born on the old place in 1808. In the latter year, Mr. Woods
purchased 200 acres of
land of Daniel
Feagins and it was upon a portion of this
purchase that he laid out the original town in 1819, probably naming it from
his former residence,
Georgetown, Ky.
His son, James Woods, who laid out an addition to the town in 1820, settled
here with his father, and there were several other children.
When Peter L. Wilson came to Georgetown,
in the winter of 1821-22, there was not a finished building in the place. Two
or three brick houses were up, but their gable ends were open, and a frame
house stood where the city bakery now is, having in it timber enough for two
ordinary structures. There were then but five or six houses in the town in the
aggregate. A frame building stood opposite the northeast corner of the court
house square, where McKibben now is, but it was never finished. The boys were
accustomed to playing ball against its walls. It was intended for a two-story
edifice, but was finally demolished. Very few people had their homes in Georgetown
at that day. Others were coming and going, but the attractions of the place
were not yet sufficient to induce new-comers to locate. James Woods lived in a
small log cabin on Outlot 21, in the northwest part of town. Allen Woods lived
at that time in a log house which stood near the northwest corner of Main
and Main Cross Streets, a little in the rear of the brick building which e put
up on the corner, and which constitutes a part of the old American Hotel. Mr.
Wilson subsequently removed the log building. William **** was living here at
the same time, in a small, unfinished frame house where the Methodist Episcopal
Church now stands. He published the first newspaper in the place, and held
several responsible offices--Sheriff, Auditor, etc.