The Dover Light Plant / Northern Ohio Traction & Light

Side A: Electric lighting became practical after Thomas Edison patented his light bulb in 1880. In Dover, a privately-owned company provided power to the downtown’s electric streetlamps. Community leaders believed that they were being charged excessively, however, and in 1898 voters passed a bond levy for $15,000 to build a municipal power plant. The Tuscarawas County Electric Light & Power Company challenged Dover’s efforts in court and after years of litigation, a second bond issue was passed in 1907 for $35,000. After more legal challenges and an anti-light plant publicity campaign, Dover built its facility on the southern bank of the Tuscarawas River near Bank Lane and East Broadway Streets. The plant began service in 1910 and, with the Northern Ohio Traction & Light Company, supplied electricity to Dover. Side B: Northern Ohio Traction & Light (N.O.T. & L.) was based in Cleveland and owned and operated an interurban line that ran to points south through Dover to Uhrichsville. The N.O.T.& L. supplied its Dover section via a substation and also sold power to the community for its street lights. Buildings in Dover associated with the interurban included an interurban car barn at 10th and Wooster Streets, a dynamo and car maintenance building, and a freight terminal building at South Wooster Avenue and West Broadway. The interurban operated until 1929, when it and many other lines were replaced by the convenience of the automobile in the 1920s and 1930s.