Who’s Who in Grandview Heights and Marble Cliff

From the Norwester Magazine

The Norwester magazine was published monthly from November 1917 through March 1922, chronicling early suburban life in the Upper Arlington, Grandview Heights, and Marble Cliff areas. The Upper Arlington community initially published the magazine from 1917-1920 as part of their ideal to be "the finest residence district and the most cordial community in Ohio." For the final fifteen months of its publication, the communities of Grandview Heights, Marble Cliff, and Upper Arlington jointly published the Norwester. The magazine essentially served as the first newspaper to focus on the northwest suburbs of Columbus, Ohio, and it is a rich resource for historical, cultural, architectural, and genealogical information.

The cover to the right, from the September, 1921 Norwester, depicts the Curtiss J. N. Ford D. Army Training biplane.

One of the features of the magazine was a story called "Who's Who", which chronicled prominent members of the community. The following entries are from issues of the magazine Norwester dated 1921 and 1922, focused on Grandview and Marble Cliff residents. It is noted that in 1928 a renumbering of houses was done in Grandview, so the addresses were changed from the originals in the article. The Upper Arlington Historical Society has scanned multiple issues of the magazine, and they can be viewed online at http://www.uaarchives.org/cdm/landingpage/collection/p4036coll9

In 1913, Ben and King purchased 840 acres of land from James Terrell Miller to develop an “ideal residential community for Columbus.” The land appealed to the Thompsons as a residential site because of its location on high ground, its proximity to both downtown Columbus and The Ohio State University campus, and its position upwind from larger cities. The beautiful land that was once a “well-managed, immaculately kept, working farm” was subdivided into 2500 lots. In 1914 the King Thompson Company was formed to sell this new community, dubbed the Country Club District, to the public.