Old Washington, Ohio

Old Washington is one of the oldest settlements in Guernsey County, platted in eighteen oh five by George and Henry Beymer, who also ran ferries on Zane's Trace, the first road cut through Ohio. The Beymers were its founders, so locals called the place Beymerstown. Eventually the official name New Washington took hold, and the village incorporated as Washington in eighteen twenty-nine after the National Road came through.

Then postal authorities discovered another Washington already existed in Ohio, so the residents reluctantly added the prefix Old to distinguish themselves. The name captures both the community's age and its mild frustration at being second-named. Today Old Washington is a small village of a few hundred people, sitting along US Route Forty, the modern descendant of the National Road that first gave it reason to exist.