In the early 1800s, William and Eleanor Kendall owned this land, known for its natural springs, beauty, and farmland. In 1850, Elias Drake, a lawyer and former speaker in the Ohio General Assembly, bought the property, named it Tawawa or Xenia Springs, and developed a health resort hotel with summer cottages completed the following year. “Tawawa” is believed to be Shawnee for “clear or gold water,” referring to the clear, mineral-rich springs. The resort struggled from the start because it was popular with southern planters who brought enslaved entourages, provoking nearby antislavery sentiment. In October 1855, the Cincinnati Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church bought Tawawa Springs, including 54 acres, the hotel, and cottages, for $13,000 to establish a university for African Americans. Wilberforce University, the nation’s oldest private historically African American institution of higher education, was founded there in 1856. Tawawa House was remodeled for recitation rooms and other school uses, and the cottages became dormitories. The site was likely chosen in part because many African Americans had settled in Greene County through the migration of freed slaves before the Civil War and because the Underground Railroad passed through the area, while Tawawa’s natural beauty and existing buildings also made it attractive. The first university failed in 1862 as the Civil War reduced enrollment, but in 1863 Bishop Daniel A. Payne bought the property for the African Methodist Episcopal Church and became Wilberforce’s first president and the first African American to lead a university.