Albion adds hitching posts, panel to explain them

ALBION – Last week the Albion Department of Public Works installed two hitching posts and a carriage step next to the Presbyterian Church and a village parking lot on Main Street. On Thursday the DPW put up an interpretive panel that explains the historical relics.

Albion and Gaines have many of these artifacts from horse-and-buggy days. The stand up in front lawns on many side streets and along Ridge Road. (Medina also has many but it looks like Albion and the 14411 area can claim to be king of hitching posts and carriage steps.)

I helped facilitate this project with the Albion Main Street Alliance. Local residents pitched in and bought the two hitching posts – as well as two others – from Fred Pilon in Albion. The carriage step was donated by the Albion Free Methodist Church. The step went with a next-door house that was leveled about five years ago.

Another one of the hitching posts is planned for downtown in a sidewalk by Krantz Furniture. I am on the agenda for Wednesday’s County Legislature meeting at 3:35 p.m. I’m going to ask the group to accept the other hitching post and put it in the courthouse lawn next to the historical marker about a pioneer resident. That marker was installed last year and recognizes the pioneer family who built a log cabin where the County Clerk’s Building now stands.

The interpretive panel was designed by The Lake Country Pennysaver in Albion and manufactured by Takeform Architectural Graphics in Medina. A Main Street grant paid for the panel.

There is another one about Downtown Albion and the community’s historic districts that should be installed soon. That one will be in Waterman Park about a half block south of the canal.