COLUMBIANA, Ohio - Have you ever thought about how much you can learn by visiting a cemetery? It's often the foundation of history for a local community.

Friday night, the Historical Society of Columbiana and Fairfield Township is hosting a citizens tour of the historic Columbiana cemetery to help raise money for the restoration of the original chapel that was built in 1890.

"It was asked to be built by General Ephraim Holloway and Solomon Haas that were civil war soldiers and felt the need to have somewhere to go out of inclement weather, was not for anything else but a simple service at the gravesite," said Deborah Firestone-Himes, President of the Historical Society of Columbiana and Fairfield Township. "The cost was $182."

The chapel is affectionately known as the stick house or inside-out house, because of its stick-style architecture.

"The inside out building as it was called is with the framework on the outside and they believe that architecture came from over in England and Germany and Europe somewhere," said Jay Groner, a member of the historical society. "It was originally used as grain buildings because it would have a smooth inside so that none of the grain would get hung up on any of the framework and they put the sticks on the outside or the framework on the outside for support."

"We know very few examples of it here in the state of Ohio," Firestone-Himes said.

Over the years, the chapel has been moved and used as a storage facility, but has also fallen into disrepair.

"Water drainage has taken its toll," Firestone-Himes said.

The building is owned by the city, but in collaboration with the historical society, a campaign was launched called, "Fix the Sticks." It's a $100,000 project to renovate and restore the chapel. So far, the historical society has raised just over $25,000.

"The goal of the historical society and the mission is to preserve the local history, whether it's a building, it's a piece of paper, it's a photograph or a memory, it needs to be remembered," Firestone-Himes said.

To help raise money for the project, a cemetery tour will take place Friday night. It starts at Birdfish Brewing, where people can take a hayride to the cemetery and then go on a walking tour by lanternlight. The tour will make about a dozen stops at the gravesites of some prominent people in Columbiana history.

"At each of the gravesites, we'll have someone representing that person right there and tell a little bit about their life story and why their so important to Columbiana," Groner said.

Jay Groner will be playing the role of Harry Eberhardt.

"Harry was one of the historians of Columbiana, in fact his title was Mr. Columbiana for everything he had his fingers in," Groner said.

Other stops include George Webb, Leilah Beard and Harvey S. Firestone. The war memorial will also be a stop with goldstar mom talking about Lt. Gilbert Robb.

"What better tribute to give our history than to bring them back to life and to tell people to so they are remembered," Groner said. "It's important to keep the history alive so it's not just put in a book and forgotten about. We're trying to do the same thing in the schools and bring history to the schools instead of them just learning about Washington and Lincoln and some of the war heroes, to get it local and let the children know exactly what our history and what the legacy is that their inheriting."

The tour runs from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m, with the last tour leaving at 8:15 p.m. There will be food trucks, a gift card raffle and DJ at Birdfish. Catalpa Grove Farms will operate the hayride which also winds through Firestone Park.

It's a family friendly event with ticket prices at $10 for adults and $5 for children 10-and-under. All the proceeds from the event will go to the city of Columbiana Fix the Sticks Fund.

You can buy tickets at birdfishbrew.com or by calling 330-727-6384.