Historic trust hosting home tours Sunday

Tiffin Historic Trust's annual Holiday House Tour is set for 1-5 p.m. Sunday. Six houses are on the tour this year. Tickets are $20 each and are available at Great Lakes Ace Hardware, 1550 W. Market St., through Saturday. On the day of the tour, tickets can be purchased at the Grammes-Brown House, 172 Jefferson St. Joan Martin, who has been coordinating the tour for "about 25 years," said the tour was canceled last year because of the pandemic. She said about 300 people usually take part in the tour and it's particularly important to buy tickets this year because the pandemic has prevented some other fundraising activities recently. Proceeds benefit Tiffin historic preservation projects and help with maintenance costs of the trust's Grammes-Brown House. On this year's tour are the Grammes-Brown House, 172 Jefferson St.; Empire Block lofts, 140 S. Washington St., which includes tours of two lofts; the Focht House, 95 Sycamore St.; the Atkin Home, 370 Sycamore St.; the Mack Home, 498 S. Washington St.; 85 S. Sandusky St.; and St. Mary Rectory. Martin said the Mack house is newly remodeled, and people will be able to see the changes that were made to the interior. "The Grammes-House is always on the tour and there's goodies there to eat and drink," Martin said. Houses for the tour each year are chosen from among people who are willing to decorate and open their historic homes to the public for a few hours. "More and more people are starting to come around and maybe do it," she said. More volunteers are welcome, and anyone who wishes to feature a home on next year's tour should call Martin at (419) 618-0698. For more information on the tour or Tiffin Historic Trust membership, also can call her. She said many members of Tiffin Historic Trust are becoming historic themselves and the organization can use new members. Visit https://tiffinhistorictrust.org or contact the group via its Facebook page for information. The mission of Tiffin Historic Trust is to promote and develop historic preservation plans in Tiffin, to receive grants to finance preservation and restoration projects and to partner with other groups and individuals to put plans into effect.