History features are brief articles or posts about specific topics that have been written by OHC staff members, volunteers, and community members.
This page will be under development for some time as we migrate content from the old website. If you are interested in a particular article that is missing, please contact us.
by Ron Gorman, Oberlin Heritage Center volunteer docent In 1850, a young African American couple from Oberlin, acclaimed as up-and-coming spokespersons against slavery and racial injustice, gazed with optimism towards a future of bright hope for themselves, their...
by Ron Gorman, Oberlin Heritage Center volunteer docent "An act to prevent slaveholding and kidnapping in Ohio" - REPEALED! "An act to prohibit the confinement of fugitives from slavery in the jails of Ohio" - REPEALED! Monroe's 1856 Habeas Corpus Act - REPEALED! In...
By David Fiske, Co-author of Solomon Northup: The Complete Story of the Author of Twelve Years a Slave, Praeger, 2013. Though Louisiana is the primary setting for the film 12 Years a Slave, there is a connection between Oberlin and one of the characters featured in...
by Ron Gorman, Oberlin Heritage Center volunteer docent It was May 27, 1857, four years before the start of the American Civil War. On this day an armed confrontation over the issue of states' rights would occur between forces of the United States federal government...
by Ron Gorman, Oberlin Heritage Center volunteer docent The movie 12 Years a Slave, now showing in northeast Ohio, graphically depicts several deplorable aspects of American slavery, including the fact that freeborn African Americans could be kidnapped and carried...
by Ron Gorman, Oberlin Heritage Center volunteer docent It's no secret that one of the primary goals of Oberlin College in its first decades of existence was to train Americans to become missionaries who would go out into the world and crusade against slavery and...
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by Jen Graham, Ohio History Service Corps member at the Oberlin Heritage Center As a historian, I’ve fallen in love with letters. There is a striking liminality in reading someone else’s mail. It’s as if, by unfolding the delicate creases of yellowed paper and losing...
by Michelle Myers, Leadership Lorain County Intern Upon leaving my summer internship at the Oberlin Heritage Center and graduating from Swarthmore College in two years, I plan on going to nursing school and becoming a midwife. I have taken an interest in Dr. A.C....
By Mary Anne Cunningham, Assistant to the Director Last month, OHC staff visited with Michael and Dorene McAndrews of Brooksville, Florida, who traveled to Oberlin as part of a journey to research and document the history of their restored 1940 DeSoto, once hailed as...
The Lormet Community Federal Credit Union is restoring 49 South Main to its original 1950s appearance. After Oberlin’s AAA closed its doors at 49 South Main Street two years ago, Lormet Credit Union, the largest credit union in Lorain County, bought the property to...
Stofan Studio on East College Street in Oberlin, circa 1970.(Photograph by Michael Wm. Kelly) Andrew Stofan operated a photo studio in downtown Oberlin from the 1934 to 1974. He took pictures of every Oberlin High School senior class during that time period except...
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