National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, Central Branch, 4100 West Third Street, Dayton, Montgomery County, OH

Significance: The Soldiers National Home in Dayton, Ohio, built in 1867, was the largest and most ambitious of the three original soldiers' national homes established by the United States government following the Civil War. Several facets of the National Home Program made it unique and signified new directions in federal policies. First, the homes were on of the first planned, non-religious communities in the country. Second, the facilities for training, readjustment, and education were the earliest federal venture into large-scale rehabilitation programs. Third, the Soldiers National Home in Dayton, Ohio accepted both black and white veterans. The Home was not integrated by today's standards, however, with separate barracks and tables in the Dining Hall. The landscape design of the Soldiers National Home in Dayton, Ohio was grand in scale and ambitious in nature. The original landscape features included lakes, rock gardens, a greenhouse and conservatory, parade grounds, an earthern-work fort, rock grotto, a deer park, an alligator pond, and a zoo that featured bears, wolves, foxes, raccoons, and rabbits. The uniqueness of these features made the Home an early tourist attraction in the midwest.
Survey number: HABS OH-2364
National Register of Historic Places NRIS Number: 03001412