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Our History
Our
Beginning
The history of the Sumner organization itself is the
story of three different houses and philanthropy of three prominent Akron women
who lived in them. At her death in 1906 Miss Louise Sumner, only child of
Middlebury settler, landowner and county judge Charles Sumner, bequeathed the
family homestead to establish Sumner Home for the Aged, as it was long called.
But the 1835 Federal style stone house was deemed not suitable or large enough
for its intended reuse. Hoban High School is now located on part of the sizeable
Sumner estate, which was off South Arlington Street southwest of the Summit
County Children's Home. Today, Interstate 76 bisects that land.
1911 to 1951
Mrs. George Tod (Mary) Perkins, widowed in 1910 from
the son of Col. Simon Perkins, was planning to leave Akron to make her
 home in
New York. So it was that in 1911 she gave her large Second Empire style
residence, built in 1869 at North Prospect and Perkins Streets, to be used as
Sumner Home for the Aged. It was opened almost immediately, receiving 10
residents in its first year. The stables were soon remodeled to provide 21
rooms, making a total of 60 rooms including the main house.
1951 to
2003
In 1935 Eleanor Baldwin Gibbs, widow of Harry H.
Gibbs and sewer-pipe heiress in her own right, died leaving the Gibbs mansion on
Merriman Road and a substantial cash bequest to Sumner Home. It was decided that
the Home would eventually relocate, as such need was becoming increasingly more
apparent. But it was not until 1951 that the move was made to the Gibbs mansion,
after major alterations to part of the house and construction of the north wing.
Today
In 2003, the Sumner Board of Trustees decided to
concentrate the organization's efforts on Sumner on Ridgewood, our
wonderful state-of-the-art community in Copley Township that affords the
best of retirement living on a lovely 64-acre campus. The Sumner and
Perkins houses are now gone, and the Gibbs mansion is a wonderful
memory. But all three are a constant reminder of the generosity and
concern of those three Akron women.
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 Sumner
on Ridgewood is a Not-for-Profit Organization.
Managed by Life Care
Services LLC
www.lcsnet.com |
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Louise Sumner
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Mary
Perkins
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Eleanor Gibbs
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