Niles industrialist James Ward, Sr. built the Ward-Thomas House in 1862. Its low-pitched roof, wide bracketed eaves, and rounded window and door openings reflect the Italianate style. Ward had moved to Niles in 1842 and built the James Ward & Company iron rolling mill. After Ward, Sr. was murdered in 1864, James Ward, Jr. took over and expanded his father’s business interests, but economic downturns in the 1870s and early 1880s forced the closing of the Ward enterprises in Niles. Another industrialist, John R. Thomas, who founded the Niles Firebrick Company in 1872, acquired the house in 1887. The company manufactured bricks that lined furnaces used to smelt iron and steel and remained one of the city’s important industries until the 1960s. Thomas’s daughter Mary Ann Waddell, wife of Jacob Waddell, lived in the house until 1969. In 1978, the Thomas family deeded the property to the city of Niles, and it became the home of the Niles Historical Society. The house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984.