William McKinley Birthplace, Ohio

William McKinley, the 25th president, was born at this site in 1843 in Niles, Ohio, and lived here for nine years, until his family moved away. Afterwards the house was occupied by various families and businesses, until the property was bought in 1890 by a bank. Instead of demolishing the home, it was cut in half, with one half moved to the back of the lot, and the other half moved to an amusement park, and the bank was built on the former house site. The two half houses were turned into usable independent buildings, one of which was a McKinley Museum for a while. In 1909, the two halves were purchased by a developer, who put them back together as the centerpiece for a housing development three miles away called McKinley Heights, where the reconstructed house became the Birthplace Home Museum. In 1937 the by-then vacant museum burned to the ground, and the site is now a shopping plaza parking lot. In 2001, the McKinley Memorial Library purchased the now closed bank that occupied the actual birthplace site, and an adjacent property, and built a replica, with a non-original but functional addition in the back. It is open to the public as the McKinley Home and Research Center.