This Bluffton photo was taken around 1886. It shows the home of Rudolf and Barbara Amstutz Althaus, with their daughter, Bertha, standing at their gate.
The house is at the corner of Lawn and Elm, today just north of the St. Mary's Catholic Church parking lot.
You'd have to be 72 or older to appreciate and recognize this former Bluffton scene. It's a fire escape on the Bluffton grade school that was razed in 1954. The building stood on the site what is now the elementary multipurpose room and playground. Paul Diller took this photo and Jim, his son, shares it with Icon viewers.
On the final day of school in 2004 Phil Zimmerly, at the time a bus driver for Buckeye Charter, drove his sister and a group of her friends to the Bluffton Dairy Freeze as an end-of-school treat.
We found this photo is a box of miscellanous Blufffton photos.
From left, Elvira Tatarkov, Lauren Kenoyer, Meredith Bixel, Katlyn Sheridan, Ashton Cluts, Amber Risner, Andrea Spallinger and Brittany Spence. This was the end of 5th grade for these girls.
Here is a photograph of students who attended the Elm Center country school in 1916-17.
This school was located between Bluffton and Pandora. Today it would be in the Pandora-Gilboa school district. When this photo was taken each of the students spoke Swiss dialect at home, and English in school.
The teacher is Millen Geiger.
Front row from left, Ralph Diller, Monroe Hilty, Melvin Bucher, Ben Burry, Leonard Badertscher and Vilas Burry.
Just to remind viewers what the aftermath of a heavy winter storm leaves on Main Street, here are two Bluffton winter scenes from the 1950s.
Paul Diller took the photos. The photo above shows the Edelweiss Restaurant with a Basinger Furniture billboard on the wall.
Today Edelweiss Restaurant is Ellerbrock Spine and Soft Tissue office, 120 N. Main St. In place of the Basinger billboard is the Oscar Velasquez Main Street mural.
And, today, Basinger Furniture is The Black Lab. What's missing from this photo? The awning over the Main Street sidewalk.
It's Founders Hall at Bluffton College in the 1950s. You are viewing the Bluffton Men's Garden Club annual flower show. If you look close enough Kermit Herr is probably somewhere in the crowd.
During its day, this annual show could rival the entries in the Allen County Fair flower show.
Paul Diller took this photo and Jim Diller shares it with the Icon.
