THE WAGNALLS MEMORIAL
Since 1925

The WONDER OF WAGNALLS is the beauty of the facility, the quality of the services, its support of cultural arts, and a small-town community atmosphere which all make Wagnalls a treasure worth finding.

Limited edition watercolor by Dick Weiser.
Available for sale in the library.

Located just south of Columbus in Lithopolis, Ohio the building is constructed of native free stone. This Tudor-Gothic building provides the people of Central Ohio with a center for educational, cultural and literary arts activities.

The original building has an auditorium, a library, a banquet hall, and two tower rooms. The auditorium, seating 300+, has a high oak-beamed ceiling with a motion picture projection room at the rear. The banquet hall with a capacity for 150 people, a small stage with piano, and a complete kitchen is located on the lower level of the original Memorial Building. Other additions to the original building have an expanded space for the library, a museum, and meeting room space. The banquet hall, auditorium, meeting rooms and garden area are available to rent for meetings or special events. The facilities are very active throughout the year.

In 1925 Mabel Wagnalls Jones designed and built The Wagnalls Memorial library and community center in memory of her parents, Anna and Adam Wagnalls. Adam was the co-founder of The Funk & Wagnalls Publishing Co. The Memorial is located in Lithopolis because both of Mabel’s parents were born and lived here. At her death in 1946, Mabel Wagnalls Jones left the bulk of her estate to The Memorial. Much good has been accomplished since the 1925 original construction and 1946 donation.

• $6,763,108+ given for scholarships from 1948 to present involving 3,200 +  students, who attended 276+ different colleges
• $4,933,036+ for building projects with additions in 1960, 1983, 1991, and 1999 – providing space for library expansion, museum, offices, and meeting rooms. The additions continued the architectural theme established in the original building.
• $25 million+ paid out for all expenses related to the many different services provided for the past 80 years

Mabel Wagnalls was the only child of Anna and Adam Wagnalls, co-founder of the Funk and Wagnalls Publishing Company. Her parents were both born in Lithopolis. Mabel was a concert pianist and was the author of nine books. She died in March of 1946 leaving her estate for the perpetual care of this community center as a living Memorial to her parents. Mabel, her parents, husband and grandmother are buried in the Lithopolis Cemetery, located at the east end of town.

Mabel Wagnalls Jones made gifts of exceptional size and devotion to home town people. She designed and built the Wagnalls Memorial Library and Community Center. She then gave it to the people of Lithopolis and Bloom Township, Ohio. This gift expressed the loyality of her parents, Hester Anna Willis Wagnalls and Adam Wagnalls, to the town and township in which they were born.

Mabel followed this gift with additional gifts of nearly all of her wealth to sustain and improve the Library and Community Center, and to provide scholarships for residents of Lithopolis and Bloom Township to "institutions of learning, music and art"

Lulu Harshfield's closing of her history of The Wagnalls Memorial is worthy of your consideration: "Because a daughter honored her mother and father, because a mother and father remembered their modest beginnings and their youthful struggles to obtain education, and because of necessity of an education had been engendered in the hearts of Ohio pioneers, Lithopolis, Ohio, and Bloom Township have a community center, a library, and a scholarship program worthy of emulation."

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The Lithopolis Cemetery, also known as Baugher, Miner, or Zangmeister Cemetery, is located in the small town of Lithopolis, Ohio. The cemetery was established in 1830. The Wagnalls' family graves (the people who donated/built the Wagnalls Memorial Library in 1925) are located in this cemetery. Their graves are very easy to find, they are in a special section across from the older Mausoleum.  (website image courtesy)