Silver Lake, circa late 1800s
Hudson Library & Historical Society
City dwellers could swap streetlamps for starlight — and rent two-story framed cottages, fully furnished, for $2 a day at Silver Lake Park at the turn of the 19th century. From tents to log cabins and Swiss-style cottages, its campground on Silver Lake was a destination. Campers often named their campsites with titles, such as Camp Delight — like Katherine Rogus and Bertha Rideout did with their group of mostly Hudsonites, pictured here. The park featured attractions, such as a menagerie of 40 animals across 20 species, including monkeys from Africa, anteaters from Australia and one of Ohio’s first aquariums. Called “the Coney Island of the West,” it also had a steamboat, miniature railway and an amusement park with more than 30 attractions, including a water toboggan slide. By 1903, the growing number of visitors — due to a nearby railway and trolley service — required more lodging, so the Silver Lake Hotel was built. Though the park closed in 1917, locals can now camp lakeside at spots like Mineral City’s Atwood Lake, where campers stay at over 600 sites accommodating cabins, tents and RVs April through October.
