Masonry work to give new entrance presidential look
Work continues on the decorative masonry, lighting and signs that will give the driving entrance to the Hayes Presidential Library & Museums a stately, presidential look.
As scheduled, construction on the stone walls started in early June and will be completed this summer. The entrance remains open during construction.
This comes nearly a year after the new, two-way driving entrance was installed. The entrance and ground needed to settle for about a year before the masonry work began.
The granite walls will include lighting and an engraving of Hayes Presidential’s logo and the presidential seal used during the Hayes administration. This phase of the entrance project is expected to cost $226,000.
Lee Koenig, a Fremont native, generous philanthropist and businessman who passed away earlier this year, donated $200,000 toward this cost. Koenig was very involved in the process and suggested using the granite that will come from a local farm for the walls.
Last year, he and his wife, Caryl, attended the ribbon-cutting for the new entrance and received framed renderings of what the entrance will look like upon completion.
“Without the generous gift from Lee and Caryl, this project would not have been possible,” said Sue Berryman, Hayes Presidential director of development. “Lee wanted to honor his parents, William and Clara Koenig, who were the founders of Crown Battery in Fremont in 1926. There will be a granite marker recognizing his parents placed in the stone wall.”
The remaining $26,000 was funded through bequests from the estates of Mary Shaffer, Dwight Wise and Richard A. Geyman and a pledge by Bob Moyer.
The walls will be built with granite taken from the Ray Murray Farms, a local property in Jackson Township outside Fremont. The farm has a couple ties to Spiegel Grove.
Spiegel Grove and the farm are on the Harrison Trail that U.S. soldiers used to travel between Fort Stephenson in Fremont and Fort Meigs in Perrysburg during the War of 1812. That trail was also known as the Sandusky-Scioto Trail and was used by Native Americans.
William J. Havens, great-great-grandfather of John Havens, Hayes Presidential building & grounds superintendent, homesteaded Ray Murray Farms.
“Growing up, Brad Murray and I have been friends and in each other’s weddings,” John Havens said. “So I have spent a lot of time growing-up on the property and in the home. There are a lot of stories when the Havens lived there. It means a lot to the Murray family and myself that these unique granite stones pushed down from northern Canada will be forever here at Spiegel Grove.”
Thousands of years ago, glaciers pushed the granite from Canada and deposited them in this area, he said.
The contractors for the masonry work are Quality Masonry Company Inc., Valley Electric Company and Toledo Sign. When the masonry work is completed, landscaping of the entrance is expected to begin in the fall and continue in spring 2025.