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New signposts for formerly nameless paths are part of Boy Scout's public service project
By Bruce F. Griffin
Special to the Beacon Journal
Published on Friday, Oct 03, 2008
COPLEY TWP.: The three paths in Copley Township's Community Park now trace the community's history.
Thanks to the effort of Boy Scout Alan Smith, the formerly nameless trails have new names and new meaning.
Naming the trails and installing signposts are part of a public service project to help Alan earn his Eagle Scout rank. The teenager dreamed up the project and solicited financial backing from township trustees.
Names on the trail signposts go back to the township's roots.
Two honor William Gardiner, the man local history credits with the community's founding; his wife, Elizabeth Greene; and her father, John Singleton Copley.
The third trail honors an early settler, Jonah Turner, a Pennsylvania soldier who fought in the War of 1812. When the soldier passed through the area on his way to battle, he was so taken with the landscape that he pledged to return after the war's end. He kept his promise and returned in 1814.
Alan, 17, a member of Boy Scouts of America Troop 382, said he hopes to start work by the end of the month.
The Copley High School senior put the project's cost at $5,500. Before approaching trustees, he had already raised $1,300.
The trustees agreed to contribute $4,200 toward the effort.
The 70-acre park in the center of the township was once a quarry, said township Service Director Mark Mitchell.
Township workers have offered to help if Alan and his troop members encounter difficulty in digging holes for the signs.
Alan said the trail signs from Plastic Lumber in Akron will be made of plastic but designed to look like natural wood. The project includes installing two additional signs that will point out park amenities, like parking lots, baseball fields and a skating rink.
The teen's father, Duane, a certified public accountant with WIL Laboratories in Ashland, said work on installing the signposts would probably start by the end of the month or beginning of November.
''He's gotta be done by December,'' he said.
Taking the trail names from the pages of Copley's history, Alan named the three trails Greenfield, four-tenths of a mile in length; Gardiner, seven-tenths; and Turner, at one-mile the longest.
According to history, in 1807 what is now Copley was purchased by Gardiner and his wife. The township was then part of the Western Reserve Territory.
Though earlier known as Greenfield, the name Copley was given to the area in honor of Gardiner's wife, Elizabeth. She was the daughter of John Singleton Copley, a famous artist of the period.
COPLEY TWP.: The three paths in Copley Township's Community Park now trace the community's history.
Get the full article here.
Comments
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Bizarrebertucky, OH
Posted 07:50 AM, 10/03/2008
Where the heck is there a 70 acre park in Copley ? I've lived right down the street from there for 46 years, and never knew such a place existed.
Akron, OH
Posted 08:59 AM, 10/03/2008
Right on Copley Road in between Cleveland Massilon and Jacoby... Its HUGE!
Posted 10:22 AM, 10/03/2008
CORRECTION: Copley had been part of a parcel of the Western Reserve Territory purchased in 1807 by William Gardiner and Elizabeth Greene as their portion in the first "Ohio Lottery." Turner purchased 321 acres of this land for $900, with a down payment of $18.
Elizabeth Greene's maiden name is Copley!
Akron, OH
Posted 03:15 PM, 10/03/2008
The entrance to the park is across from PVS Chemicals on Copley Rd, between the Rose Lounge and Crusade Baptist Church.
chesapeake, VA
Posted 03:13 AM, 10/04/2008
gee Warren, if you lived there so long you must have been one who used the property to ride dirt bikes or ice skate or target shoot there. 3 M property.
