On October 3, 1868, Franklin native General Robert C. Schenck campaigned for reelection to the U.S. House of Representatives from Ohio's Third Congressional District at a large Republican rally near Carlisle, where former Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton was the featured speaker. The Schenck-Stanton delegation arrived by train from Dayton and proceeded to the rally site, and one account called the gathering place a beautiful grove. According to the Lebanon Western Star, six brass bands, along with uncounted fifes and drums, artillery companies, delegations of mounted men, and Boys in Blue made it a demonstrative occasion. Local Republican newspapers estimated attendance as high as 40,000, while Democratic papers placed it at 2,000-3,000. Schenck defeated Dayton's Clement Vallandigham, a leader of the Peace Democrats, or Copperheads, during the Civil War. Nearby stood the Carlisle depot of the Cincinnati, Hamilton and Dayton railroad, which began operations in 1851 as the second railroad through Warren County. Carlisle Station served as a passenger and freight-shipping depot and was joined in 1872 by another depot in nearby Franklin built by the Cincinnati and Springfield Railroad, later part of the Big Four and the New York Central Railroads. The community was originally known as the Jersey Settlement because many early 1800s settlers came from New Jersey. George Carlisle, vice-president of the Cincinnati, Hamilton and Dayton, bought a large tract of land there, and after he and his wife Sarah donated a lot in 1856, residents renamed the place Carlisle Station. Around 1856, the Carlisle Literary Association built a hall on that lot, and as of 2019 it remained as the older section of Carlisle's municipal building.