herr2ck: Columbus - Italian Village

March-April 2026.

Some neighborhood landmarks from the 3rd Avenue viaduct near Smith Bros. Hardware--the Wonder Bread sign and St. John’s steeple.

Italian Village is Columbus’s ethnically Italian neighborhood, just like German Village, Hungarian Village, etc. At first a largely working-class area with several factories that employed residents, it has since gentrified, with many houses built on the sites of former factory buildings.

Italian Village is located on the near north side of Columbus, Ohio. It is bordered by 5th Avenue and Weinland Park to the north, I-670 and downtown to the south, the Big 4 railroad and Milo-Grogan to the east, and High Street and the Short North to the west.

History

Italian Village was founded as one of Columbus’s first suburbs. High Street’s extension northward from downtown, which connected it to Worthington eight miles to the north, was built from 1829 to after 1849. This resulted in development along the street, including the construction of Italian Village. However, despite the neighborhood’s current name (which was coined in 1973), Italian immigrants did not create Italian Village.

The Piscitelli family circa 1930, one of the more famous Italian families in the neighborhood. (Short North Gazette)

The earliest inhabitants of the area were actually Irish immigrants, as at the time they settled north of Union Station and near Naghten Street (nicknamed “Irish Broadway,” now Nationwide Boulevard) beginning in 1850. They were drawn to the area by the growing railroads and the newly built Union Station. As these Irish residents grew more prosperous, they moved out of the area. Italian Village was annexed into Columbus in 1862. This early settlement and history makes it the oldest neighborhood north of downtown Columbus. In its time, it was known as the Old North End (not to be confused with Old North Columbus, originally a town known as North Columbus).

Italian Village was industrial in nature and a working-class neighborhood at the time (compared to the more affluent Victorian Village to the west), and many nearby factories such as Jeffrey Manufacturing and the railroads had jobs that were reliable and walkable. The first Italian residents arrived from nearby Flytown beginning in the 1890s, working at the factories or Marble Cliff quarries. Additionally, the northeast corner of the neighborhood was largely Black, as they were employed at the railroad and iron works. Resident Joe Pishitelli noted that the area’s composition had ethnicities from all across Europe, such as Greeks, Germans, and Poles. Remember, in the 19th and early 20th century, European immigrants were “othered” just as how Black, Hispanic, and Arabic people are today, even though most European ethnicities are seen as “white” today. With this diverse population, Ward 9, which included Italian Village, had 5,048 residents as of 1890.

4th Street at Warren Street in 1926. At right is Jeffrey Mfg, while the industrial building across the street is Columbus Metal Products Co. At far left is The Warren, a rowhouse which still stands. (Columbus Neighborhoods)

By the turn of the 20th century, Italian Village had expanded to roughly its present size and density. Streetcars ran from downtown Columbus into the neighborhood via High Street and 4th Street (recently connected to downtown via a new viaduct in 1895), allowing residents to travel downtown for work or shopping. St. John the Baptist Catholic Church was completed in 1898, providing a major cultural center for the neighborhood, as the services were conducted in Italian and used practices that were familiar back home. Despite the hardships of the Great Depression, locally-grown Italian food was a much cheaper alternative to expensive store-bought groceries.

I-670 under construction in Italian Village. (All Columbus Data)

As was incredibly common for working-class and ethnic neighborhoods in the mid-20th century, Italian Village suffered a decline after World War II. More affluent residents fled to the suburbs, and lower-income families took their place. Local businesses struggled, as the poorer neighborhood could no longer afford to shop there, and they faced competition from supermarkets accessible by car. The single-family homes were subdivided into smaller apartments. The Goodale Expressway’s (now I-670) construction demolished several blocks on the southern side of the neighborhood, displacing families and destroying landmarks such as Engine House No. 4, and leaving a small section with Smith Bros. Hardware and other industries completely surrounded by highway ramps.

Houses in Italian Village in 1996. (NRHP listing)

Facing the continued destruction of their neighborhood, Italian Village residents founded the Italian Village Society in 1973 to advocate for its preservation and revitalization. Coupled with city council’s establishment of the Italian Village Commission, the Italian Village Development Plan was created by residents and Ohio State students in 1974. The gist was to maintain the area’s remaining housing stock and historic landmarks, while also encouraging new development that was in line with the area’s character. These efforts were successful, and middle-class families returned to the neighborhood in the 1980s, in tandem with the Short North’s ongoing gentrification.

Today, Italian Village has similar demographics and amenities as the Short North. Many of its formerly industrial properties have been demolished and redeveloped into apartments. New businesses such as Fox in the Snow Cafe (extremely popular with residents for good reason) and the Budd Dairy Food Hall draw in visitors.

Photos

Warren Square Park

1996 photo of the park. (NRHP listing)

Warren Square Park, formerly Christopher Columbus Square beginning in 1974, is a tiny park near the intersection of Warren Street and Hamlet Street. It is probably the smallest park in Columbus at just 0.059 acres in size. After a petition from the Italian Village Society in 2022, the park received its new name, in accordance with the park district’s guidelines that parks can be renamed if the original “comes into disrepute in relation to the community at large.” An Italian-American resident sued the city in 2024 to contest this change, but presumably lost.

The red brick duplex at left is apparently a Yost & Packard design (the William & Nettie Simonton House), though a less architecturally distinguished one.

Note the new fencing and brick sidewalk.

The debate about Christopher Columbus’s legacy in the city that bears his name is one that has gotten very inflamed over the years. It is true that he spurred a wave of colonialism that displaced and killed many of America’s native people, but at the same time, he is a national symbol for the people of Italy. In particular, City Hall’s now-absent statue of Columbus was done by an Italian sculptor, so Italian-American residents were displeased with its removal. My two cents is that maybe a compromise can be reached--keep the statue off of City Hall’s lawn, but it could be donated to the Italian residents who want it still on display and not mothballed in an archive somewhere.

I’m not sure of the Italian Village Society’s ethnic composition--for all I know, it could be a bunch of non-Italian people who moved in and gentrified the neighborhood. Still, the fact that the neighborhood as a whole voted for the park’s name to be changed is important.

Ady Building (765 Summit Street)

Looking south down Summit Street towards where the 3rd Street viaduct runs today in 1956. 765 Summit is on the right. The buildings at center have been demolished for the highway. (Columbus Metropolitan Library)

This is a very rare example of a “corner store” with its original storefront design. It was built before 1891, but probably within a couple years, in an interesting hybrid of the Queen Anne and Second Empire styles. It has a mansard roof, dormers, and hood molds that are common in the Second Empire style. However, the storefront design and large turret are more common Queen Anne features. The Old North End NRHP listing names it the “Ady Building,” presumably after an old tenant.

1996 photo of the building. (NRHP listing)

A look at the building today from the same angle:

Along with its intact storefronts, the original slate roof and other details on the building remain unmodified. It is highly unusual for a building to remain in an unaltered state such as this one for its lifetime. I have always loved its steeply-pitched turret and colorful transom windows on the storefronts.

The rear of the building, 108-116 Warren Street, is a series of rowhouses. This is a common setup in Columbus.

What a gorgeous building.

Bethany Baptist Church (Bethany Baptist Colored Church)

This church was established in 1882 by Italian Village’s Black population (hence the “colored” in the church’s original name). As of 1901, the congregation occupied a small, square wood-frame church immediately south of the site of the current building, and it had dropped the “colored” suffix from its name. At that time, 6th Street was very sparsely populated, with many nearby lots laid out but not yet built upon.

The current Gothic Revival church was built between 1901 and 1910, as it appears on the 1910 Baist map. It is a vernacular brick design with a modest tower on the corner of 4th Avenue and 6th Street.

A stone tablet above the entrance states the building’s name, even though the congregation is long gone:

As of 1951, the church still occupied their building. However, in 1966, it was sold to a different parish known as “Beth Jacob Congregation.” It was purchased again in 1968 by Full Gospel Pentecostal Church, and it apparently ceased religious use in 1980. Since 1997, it has been owned by some LLC called “New Victorians,” sitting vacant for about two decades.

The church as of 2015. (Google Maps)

The former church appeared to suffer a fire in 2014 or 2015, as Google Streetview from October 2015 shows scorch marks on the exterior walls and newly boarded-up windows. By 2016, the exterior was shored up with steel bracing, and permits for renovation work were issued in 2020. As of today, it has been renovated into apartments.

Bethany Baptist itself, or a congregation with a similar name, still exists today at 959 Bulen Avenue in Driving Park.

A trendy new addition was built onto the rear:

132 East 5th Avenue & 1198-1202 Summit Street

The Franklin County Auditor claims this mixed-use building on 5th Avenue and its adjacent rowhouse on Summit Street were built in 1919, but they both appear on the 1910 Baist map. Since they don’t show up on the 1901 Sanborn (only a single wood house or something on the site), they were built sometime that decade. According to the 1921 Sanborn map, the storefront nearest Summit was a drugstore, while the other was just labeled “S” for “store.”

An otherwise vernacular Commercial-style building, what interested me the most was the vibrant Creamsicle shade of brick that the upper 20-ish courses use, versus the duller brown brick that the rest of the building is built of. I wonder if they ran out and had to dip into the rowhouse’s stock?

Next door is The Hamlet, a National Register-listed rowhouse that I’ve also visited.

West facade:

According to one source, the owner of Ace of Cups in Old North is opening a cocktail bar called Let Me Roll It inside, which was supposed to open in May of this year. According to their own Instagram, they now open in August instead.

The rowhouse next door, a common Columbus-style design with vaulted windows and a bulky cornice: