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1800 - The Division Act creates the Indian Territory
A bill was introduced in the House of Representatives providing for the division of the Northwest Territory into two separate governments. It passed the House on March 31 and the Senate on April 21 in an amended form. After agreement had been achieved in a conference committee, it was approved by President John Adams on May 7, 1800. The principal supporters of the measure were William Henry Harrison, territorial delegate from Northwest Territory, and Robert C. Harper of South Carolina. -
Congress authorizes formation of a state government in Ohio.
An act to enable the people of eastern division of the territory northwest of the river Ohio to for, constitution and state government and for the admission of such state into the union on an equal footing with the original states, and for other purposes -
Ohio Abolishes Slavery
Slavery was abolished in Ohio by the states original constitution. But at the same time, Ohio, with slave state Kentucky across the river, took the lead in aggressively barring black immigration. It was a requirement of the Northwest Ordinace. -
Ohio became the 17th State
The State of Ohio celebrates Ohio statehood on March 1. The reason for this is because the Ohio General Assembly met for the first time on this day in 1803. In reality, Ohio became a state on February 19, 1803, when President Jefferson endorsed the United States Congress's decision to grant Ohio statehood. -
War of 1812
On September 10, 1813, nine small, outgunned ships defeated a Royal Navy fleet of six heavy vessels in the Battle of Lake Erie. That feat of courage proved to be yet another morale-building stepping stone for a U.S. military trying to put a successful end to the bloody war of 1812. Ohio was one of the main battlegrounds, and it was a defensive front and a staging area for the invasion of British held territory. -
Ruther B Hayes becomes president
Rutherford B. Hayes, the 19th president of the United States, was born in Delaware, Ohio. Hayes was a major-general in the Civil War, then an Ohio congressman, then succeeded Grant as president (1877-81). Hayes won the Electoral College by a margin of one vote after his opponent won the popular vote in an election so fraught with charges of vote fraud that there were even fears of a coup. Hayes refused to seek a second term. -
Ohio and Erie Canal
It was completed in 1834 between Cleveland and Portsmouth, Ohio. This 308-mile-long canal was the final link in an inland waterway connecting the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River System. The Canal allowed goods to travel from Ohio down the Mississippi to the Gulf of of Mexico and from Cleveland on Lake Erie to Buffalo and from there to the east coast. A continuation of the Erie Canal, the Ohio and Erie Canal was funded. Constructed by engineers and the Irish immigrant labor gangs. -
Toledo War
The Toledo War was a border dispute between the State of Ohio and the Michigan Territory during the first several decades of the nineteenth century. The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 established the northern boundary of Ohio as "an east west line drawn through the southerly bend of extreme of Lake Michigan." The United States Congress restated this line as Ohio's northern boundary in the Enabling Act of 1802, the legislation that led Ohio to become a state -
Oberlin College
Oberlin College which was named Oberlin Collegiate Institute until 1850, is a private liberal arts college in Oberlin, Ohio. In 1833, Presbyterian ministers John Jay Sipherd and Philo P. Stewart founded the institution as a college preparatory institute to promote Christian values. It became the first predominantly white collegiate institution to admit African American male students and two years later it opened its doors to all women, becoming the first coeducational college in the country. -
John Brown, an abolitionist from Akron, leads raid on Harper's Ferry,
John Brown, a staunch abolitionist, and a group of his supporters left their farmhouse hide-out en route to Harpers Ferry. Descending upon the town in the early hours of October 17th, Brown and his men captured prominent citizens and seized the federal armory and arsenal. Brown had hopes that the local slave population would join the raid and through the raid’s success weapons would be supplied to slaves and freedom fighters throughout the country, but that was not the case. -
Civil War , Ohio fought for the Union but the state showed mixed feelings toward slavery.
Ohioans played an important role in the war effort. During the American Civil War, the State of Ohio provided the United States government with three types of military units: artillery units, cavalry units, and infantry units. Ohio supplied the federal government with more than 260 regiments of men; not counting several companies that formed the basis of regiments in West Virginia, Kentucky, and Massachusetts. A total of 310,654 Ohioans served in the Union army for varying lengths of time. -
Ohio State University is founded
The Ohio State University was founded in 1870 as a land-grant university in accordance with the Morrill Act of 1862 under the name of Ohio Agricultural and Mechanical College. The school was originally situated within a farming community located on the northern edge of Columbus, and was intended to matriculate students of various agricultural and mechanical disciplines. The university opened its doors to 24 students on September 18, 1873. In 1878, the first class of six men graduated. -
Benjamin Goodrich opens a rubber plant
Benjamin Franklin Goodrich helped make Akron, Ohio, the "Rubber Capital of the World" during the late 1800s. Before becoming involved in the rubber industry, Goodrich attended Cleveland Medical College (modern-day Case Western Reserve School of Medicine). He specialized in surgery. Following the American Civil War, Goodrich left medicine and became involved in other pursuits, including working in some of Pennsylvania's oilfields and, in 1867, opening a real estate office in New York City. -
The Spanish American War
The Spanish-American War, as the conflict was called, lasted less than three months and ended in a complete victory for the United States. The United States military easily defeated Spanish forces in Cuba and in the Philippines. Asa Bushnell, the governor of Ohio, provided the federal government with three regiments of Ohioans, but these soldiers did not arrive in Cuba until after the fighting was over. Approximately 15,300 Ohioans participated in the military aspects of the Spanish-American War -
The Ohio State Flag
Unique among the state flags of the union, the Ohio State Flag was designed by John Eisemann. Described as a pennant, the Ohio burgee is properly a swallowtail design. It was adopted in 1902.
The Ohio flag, unique in shape but uncomplicated in design, is filled with symbolism. The union of the flag, a large blue triangle is populated with seventeen white stars. Those that are grouped around the circle represent the thirteen original colonies. -
World War 1
Serbian nationalist named Gavrilo Princip assassinated Franz Ferdinand the Archduke of Austria, in Sarajevo. Exactly one month later, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia. The war divided Europe into two armed camps on one side was the Triple Alliance made up of Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy, and their enemy was the Triple Entente of France, Russia and Great Britain. As other countries began to join sides, the Triple Alliance became known as the Central Powers. -
The Great Depression
The Great Depression began after the Stock Market Crash in October 1929. During the late 1920s, the stock market in the United States boomed. Many people in the U.S. began to purchase stock, and the value of stocks dramatically increased. In 1924, the New York Times index of the leading twenty-five industrial stocks topped the one hundred point mark. By the beginning of 1928, these same stocks had topped 245 points. The market continued to soar during 1928 and much of 1929. -
The Ohio Flood
In January 1937 there was a great flood. The Ohio River, which was usually high in the winter, spilled over, causing more than $75 million worth of damages. The river had seemed harmless, but conditions of unusually high water, snow melting in the mountains, eighteen straight days of precipitation, and the low level of the towns of Shawneetown and Cairo combined so that these two small towns were almost completely covered by water. -
World War 2
Coming just two decades after the last great global conflict, the Second World War was the most widespread and deadliest war in history, involving more than 30 countries and resulting in more than 50 million military and civilian deaths (with some estimates as high as 85 million dead). Sparked by Adolf Hitler’s invasion of Poland in 1939, the war would drag on for six deadly years until the final Allied defeat of both Nazi Germany and Japan in 1945. -
US enters World War II, about 20,000 Ohio servicemen will be killed
Three Ohioans won Congressional Medals of Honor for their heroism during the attack on Pearl Harbor, including Rear Admiral Isaac Campbell Kidd of Cleveland, Machinist's Mate First Class Robert R. Scott of Massillon, and Seaman First Class James Richard Ward of Springfield. All three men died during the attack, sacrificing their lives for others. Numerous other Ohioans also died at Pearl Harbor.
