Before Seaman began in 1882, local men formed Company E of the 70th Ohio Volunteer Infantry and served in the Civil War from December 23, 1861, to August 14, 1865, reflecting the moral beliefs of the surrounding community. Seaman Station was built in 1882, the village grew around the depot, and Seaman was incorporated in 1911. A disastrous fire in 1910 nearly wiped out the business district, after which the Allison Building was constructed in 1911 on State Route 247 and still stands, now housing Seaman Flower and Gift Shop. Other business buildings on the southern end of the business strip included a structure occupied by I.N. Wickerham Pharmacy, later Thorp's Pharmacy in the 1960's and currently Fitzgerald's Pharmacy, and another building that advertised Sharples Tubular Cream Separators, later became Doak's Grocery, also served as a restaurant, and now houses Budget Boutique. Main Street sites included a gas station operated by George Carroll and Pete Gaston on the present site of Life Squad Station #2, and the home and dentist office of Dr. Otis U. Knechtly where Lions Club Park is now located. Other notable buildings included the Knights of Pythias Building on Tri County Road, with the Masonic Lodge upstairs and Just the Tease Salon and Seaman Barber Shop on the ground floor, the barbershop and laundry of W.A. Stephenson, and Greentee's Bakery in the Shreffler's Hardware building. Frank G. Young, a Seaman resident, published A Town in The Makin', History of Seaman, Ohio in the early mid-1930's, preserving local and early history in words and pictures. Will Rogers, known as "The Black King of The Air," lived in Seaman and, according to reports of the time, was the only black hot air balloonist in the United States from the mid 1890's through the early 1920's. Community life also included Wendell Crawford's 1954 heavyweight tractor pulling contest victory at the Seaman Street Fair, now the Seaman Fall Festival, and Afta McCormick Lamison's millinery shop, opened in 1898 on South Street, where women came by train from Cincinnati to buy high-quality hats. Nearby landmarks included a covered bridge two miles north of Seaman on State Route 247 over the West Fork of Ohio Brush Creek, later replaced by ODOT; Mount Leigh Presbyterian Church, first serving in June 1826, later rebuilt in the village in 1907 and dedicated on Easter Sunday, 1908; and the Mount Leigh School District No. 8 on Greenlee Road, which consolidated with Seaman Village School in 1912. Twentieth-century businesses included Geeslin's Sohio Station at State Route 247 and Tri County Road, still standing though no longer a service station, and the Seaman Creamery, erected in 1908 at Broadway and Fourth Street to make butter from local cream before later serving as an ice plant and being torn down around 1960. Stephen Kelley, a lifelong Seaman resident who lived from 1949 to 2011, worked as a historian and author, published Ohio Southland, A Quarterly Journal Exploring The Heritage of Southern Ohio, and helped preserve irreplaceable photographs and historical facts.