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A View of the C & O R.R. |
Aerial View of Foster |
On the C&O in Foster. Note the upside down steam engine in the creek.
from a Facebook post by the Augusta Kentucky Historic District
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| Main Street | A view of the Hill Tops |
A big thanks to Ronald Dunn and Janet Costigan for these two of Foster!
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The Foster Pike |
The Odd Fellows Cemetery |
Cincinnati Commercial,December 8, 1872
Foster, c. 1911
Built in 1879 as an Odd Fellows Hall upstairs, retail downstairs. You may know it as the Dot Food Store, Marlene Agnew's Store or Doris Reinheimer's Store. Earlier run by Dave Iler and Harold Krameen. The Odd Fellows are long gone, as are the gas pumps that used to sit in front of the store. From a Facebook post by Mary Overstreet Eshman |
Foster Bank
Foster State Bank Closes, the story is here.
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| This is Captain Anthony Meldahl (July 26, 1854 - January 26, 1923 ), for whom the Meldahl Locks and Dam are named. The steamer is the Cayuga, which bore Capt. Meldahl to his grave, in Neville, across the Ohio from Foster. Read more in this article. (pdf) | Meldahl Dam construction was hit by flood, March 12, 1964. | ||
Story of Meldahl Dam grand opening, here.
The official reading of the 1937 flood crest at Lock & Dam #34 was 75.50 feet.
Wait, What? The City of Hamilton, Ohio has a city park in Foster. Yup. Details.
| Serious storm hits Foster, 1849. | A September 24, 1903 issue of the Catholic Telegraph lists a Catholic mission at Foster's Landing. |
A few words on the history of the Neville- Foster ferry are here. |
Reuben Gold Thwaites dropped by Foster in 1898. He wasn't impressed. Read it here. |
| The world's record for the largest channel catfish, since eclipsed, was set by C. L. Stanley, of Foster, in 1924. He caught his 28-pound prize using chicken liver. | The Illinois was “a picture-show boat owned and operated by Tom J. Reynolds, 1913-1916. Seated 200. Ohio River system. Burned in 1916 at Foster, Kentucky.” from Philip Graham's Showboats: The History of an American Institution, 1951 |
| Locomotive explodes in Foster, 1899, details here. | “On the 13th inst., at Butler, a [baseball] match game was played between the Red Jackets, of Foster, Ky., and the Larks, of Butler, Ky. The rain ended the game at the seventh inning. Score: Larks, 72; Red Jackets, 37.” Cincinnati Enquirer, August 16, 1870 |
| Camp Comar was a prison camp in Foster. You can read the day 1 and day 2 stories of a prisoner escape from there. | |
| “Professor E. Leon, the tight-rope walker, gave a performance at Foster last Thursday. He next visits Moscow and New Richmond, Ohio, and will be at Cincinnati the Fourth of July to act some of his wonderful feats on a rope stretched from two piers of the Suspension Bridge.” Cincinnati Enquirer, June 30, 1877 | |
| Before the dams, ice in the river could be a major problem, illustrated by the 1904 ice jam at Foster. The News from Foster, 1879, here. | |
Foster dairy farmers protest; seems their milk is too warm when it gets to Cincinnati. Here. |
In 1920, the pioneers of Foster hold a reunion. Story's here. |
| Foster's James R. Quaid, who died in 1906, had been a member of Teddy Roosevelt's Rough Riders (Wikipedia) at San Juan Hill. More about him is here. | |
| The steam boat Jessee sank near Foster in 1874. You can read about it here. |
The steam boat Hornet capsized near Foster in 1832. |
| Legal action taken to stop livestock from roaming the streets of Foster, 1874. | |
| “Foster, Ky., The Union schoolhouse, located four miles from here, was destroyed by fire last night. As to the origin of it no one can tell, but is supposed to be the work of an incendiary. The building was valued at $500 and is a total loss.” from Covington's The Daily Commonwealth, November 5, 1883 | The name Foster comes from Israel Foster, a Bracken County farmer. After the Civil War, he donated land for two churches - a “Northern” and a “Southern” Methodist Church. The Northern version was closed, and in 1880 they consolidated into a single church. |
| Cincinnatians have a Foster goes excursion, 1876. | Israel Foster offers his farm for sale, “between four and five thousand acres.”in 1837. |
| History of Foster Methodist Church. |  Western Christian Advocate, September 29, 1875 |
| Foster's wharf boat was wrecked in the flood of 1884. The following winter, ice ground it up, and it floated away. |
1884 flood story from Foster. |
| An item in the February 13, 1850 Cincinnati Daily Gazette notes that the Post Office changed the name Foster's Landing to just Foster, | |
| Foster goes dry, here. | Desperado caught in Foster, 1862. |
| Mastodon bones found near Foster in 1876. Story is here. | You can read about the 15 foot snake they found in Foster, in 1880, here. |
Cincinnati Commercial, March 17, 1875
Foster was incorporated as a town by an act of the Kentucky General Assembly on January 30, 1850.
They changed the town limits in 1882.
The court order which decreed Foster was no longer an official town was issued on February 26, 1999. Read the story here. (pdf)
Notice that the town 4 miles upstream from Moscow, Ohio, is a place called "Mechanicsburg"
in this steamboat distance chart from 1855's The Western Tourist and Emigrant's Guide.
An earlier name for Foster?
In 1961 John Deere had an ad featuring Foster's Paul Florence, praising his Deere 730
The Catholic Telegraph, August 7, 1852
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How you build a railroad, |
Bold's Cash Store, |
Aerial view of Meldahl
from Wikipedia user Mfields1
