Ohio Historical Research Articles

A History of Hate in Ohio: Then and Now by Michael E. Brooks and Bob Fitrakis

Reviewed by: A History of Hate in Ohio: Then and Now by Michael E. Brooks and Bob Fitrakis Britt Halvorson Michael E. Brooks and Bob Fitrakis, A History of Hate in Ohio: Then and Now. Columbus: Trillium/The Ohio State University Press, 2021. 243 pp. $24.95 (paper). A central problem in critical whiteness studies has been what historian Kathleen Belew has identified as a perceived bifurcation between violent White nationalist groups and mainstream American life. A History of Hate in Ohio joins a variety of other recent works in challenging that division. Although it focuses mainly on White power groups, the book examines White supremacy broadly and gives attention to its many forms, from segregated [End Page 199] public schools to settler violence toward Native Americans. Collectively, these different manifestations paint a portrait of racism across different periods of Ohio history in legislative and everyday forms as well as among White mobs and White hate groups. While readers should be warned that the content is disturbing, the book's unflinching, detailed account of White racial violence in Ohio can serve as a valuable reference for not only experts but also anti-racist organizations and perhaps even movements toward reparations. One of the book's contentions is that, due to Ohio's well-documented abolitionist history, the state's longstanding White racial violence has been hidden behind a "mythology of Ohio as a racial utopia somehow free from the racism of the South" (65). The authors point repeatedly to Ohioans' ties with White hate groups and discriminatory legislation elsewhere in the U.S., questioning the state's exceptionalism in this regard. For instance, the author of the book's first half, historian Michael E. Brooks, describes how nineteenth-century Black Laws in Ohio restricted the movement of free Black individuals and were based directly on similar laws in Virginia and Kentucky that supported plantation owners' interests. The state required that, beginning in 1804, Black individuals carry a certificate of freedom. Employers could not hire people without this certificate and were subject to fines if they did so. Through a sleight of hand, the Ohio legislature even passed laws beginning in 1829 that ensured that public taxes went to the education of White but not Black children, because persons of color were not levied property taxes in support of schools. Combined with an 1861–1887 ban on interracial marriage, these laws created a far-reaching system of racial inequality, even though racial discrimination was officially banned in public spaces by a little-enforced 1884 civil rights act. Through its historical reach, the book also assembles a view of both White mob violence in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as well as its relationship to the later terror campaigns of the Black Legion, Ku Klux Klan, Aryan Nation, and other neo-Nazi groups. In one case, a White mob formed in 1862 when Black dock workers in Toledo began receiving the same wages as White laborers. In another, a White crowd of fifteen hundred gathered in Akron in 1900 when a Black man, Louis Peck, was accused and convicted of assaulting a White girl, even though Peck was later pardoned by the governor in 1916. Such mob violence eventually morphed, following the cultural rise of sympathetic portraits of White nationalism in Birth of a Nation and elsewhere, into public Klan rallies in the 1920s. These were major [End Page 200] spectacles, with one at the Wood County Fairgrounds numbering fifteen thousand people. Over the next century, White power organizations went through numerous re-groupings in Ohio, as leaders were sometimes tried for crimes or had ideological disagreements. Against this backdrop of the continued reorganization of White hate groups, the book shows that civil rights had to be legally and socially fought for by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and Black activists at each step, from Black customers being refused service at a Yellow Springs barber shop to Black patrons being denied entry to Cincinnati's Coney Island theme park (which did not admit Black patrons until 1955). By offering a meticulous analysis of Ohio's White hate groups through the present, the book also gives scholars and activists...

Coming Home to Nez Perce Country: The Niimiipuu Campaign to Repatriate Their Exploited Heritage

In Coming Home to Nez Perce Country, Trevor James Bond aims to prove that the process by which the Spalding-Allen Collection was acquired came under dubious circumstances. In doing so, Bond takes readers on a multilayered journey through history, with the collection serving as an underlying living entity, lying in wait, facing multiple challenges to return to its rightful home among the Niimiipuu.In 1847, missionary Henry Spalding shipped two barrels of Nez Perce material culture to his friend Dr. Dudley Allen in Ohio. The journey would take two years and an incredible toll on the condition of the items, yet Allen begged, “I want more [Native American collections]. They are all worth having!” (17). Bond highlights the destructive practice of missionaries and colonists removing items from tribes as well as assimilation attempts and federal policies that have historically supported these dark efforts.Nearly 150 years since the barrels were shipped, it may now seem difficult to prove the intention of Spalding’s acquisition of the collection. Using Spalding’s own words through deep archival research, primary sources, and Nez Perce oral tradition from living members of the source community, Bond ensures that the reader will find it hard to argue in favor of Spalding. While Spalding did not share the names of the Nez Perce that he took items from, the missionary ironically established more provenance than was common at the time. That provenance would come under threat in the care of the Oberlin Museum in Ohio. In 1942, the collection would be transferred to the Ohio Historical Society (OHS) for “proper” care due to storage conditions. In the care of OHS, items from the collection would be largely overlooked and separated, even mixed with other artifacts. OHS continued Spalding’s legacy of placing a dollar value on what belonged to the Nez Perce.In Coming Home to Nez Perce Country, Bond shows how the formerly overlooked collection gained attention and value through exhibit requests and then an appraisal which caused OHS to view the collection as marketable. The collection was loaned to the Nez Perce National Historic Park on an annual basis, and after appraisals (the final valuing the collection at $608,100), OHS sought to have the collection returned, refusing to work with the Nez Perce Tribe and only communicating with the National Park Service. Finally, an agreement was reached and OHS offered the collection to the tribe for the appraised amount, giving them only six months to come up with the funds. What culminated was a national effort including schoolchildren and grunge bands to raise the funds so that the Nez Perce could retain what is rightfully theirs. Their culture and history, taken from them, commodified, and sold back.The voice of the Nez Perce is vital in this book and should serve as an example of how to work with source communities regarding their cultural material. The Nez Perce do not place monetary value on these objects; rather, they see them as living entities in a familial way, even as a form of prayer. Objects made by Nez Perce hands transcend the specific purposes for which they were made. Quotes by the Nez Perce reflect this deep connection, as in Josiah Pinkham’s statement: “By bringing the collection home, we’re helping the Nez Perce people to survive” (119). These items are made from the heart and passed from generation to generation, representing who the people are, connected to their place, where they belong. Bond’s writing encourages readers to rethink both the long history of collecting and curatorial practices in the name of preservation as well as the long-overdue process of bringing material culture back home.

Editor's Note

Editor's Note Donna M. DeBlasio This issue of Ohio History brings both sad news and good news. This issue is dedicated to Stuart Stiffler, a respected scholar of nineteenth-century library history, and Owen V. Johnson, a professor who trained hundreds of students to be professional journalists around the world. Mr. Stiffler passed away on April 21, 2022. Professor Johnson passed away on August 6, 2022. Their articles in this issue are their last published works. On behalf of Ohio History and our editorial board and staff, I would like to extend our sympathies to Mr. Stiffler's and Mr. Johnson's family and friends. On a happier note, I am pleased to report that one of our authors, Dr. Perry Bush of Bluffton College, is the recipient of the Bowling Green State University Local History Publication Award for best article dealing with the history of northwest Ohio. Dr. Bush's prizewinning article, "'We Have Them Whipped Here:' Lynching and the Rule of Law in Lima, Ohio," appeared in the Fall 2021 issue of Ohio History, which can be accessed here: https://oaks.kent.edu/ohj/ohio-history-fall-2021. Congratulations from all of us at Ohio History to Dr. Bush on this honor. [End Page 8] Donna M. DeBlasio Youngstown State University Copyright © 2022 Ohio History

Notes on Contributors

Other| August 01 2022 Notes on Contributors Italian Americana (2022) XL (2): x–xii. https://doi.org/10.5406/2327753X.40.2.02 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Permissions Search Site Citation Notes on Contributors. Italian Americana 1 August 2022; XL (2): x–xii. doi: https://doi.org/10.5406/2327753X.40.2.02 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All Scholarly Publishing CollectiveUniversity of Illinois PressItalian Americana Search Advanced Search John Cavallone is a Chicago area genealogist; author of From Sassano to 48th & Federal Street: An Italian Migration at the Turn of the 20th Century and contributing author to Reconstructing Italians in Chicago: 10th Anniversary 2021 Edition and The Sassano Project. (www.sassanochicago.org). He was the proprietor of the Tenth Planet comic bookstores and has served as technology engineer for AVMA in various school districts in Northeast Illinois.Donna M. DeBlasio is professor emerita of history and the former director of the Center for Applied History and the Oral History Program at Youngstown State University. She has authored and co-authored scholarly and popular works on the history of Youngstown and the Mahoning Valley. These include five books for Arcadia publishing and the co-authored publication from Swallow Press, Catching Stories: A Practical Guide to Oral History (2009). Dr. DeBlasio is currently editor of Ohio History, published by the... You do not currently have access to this content.

Brooks and Fitrakis, A History of Hate in Ohio: Then and Now

Reviewed by: A History of Hate in Ohio: Then and Now by Michael E. Brooks and Bob Fitrakis Jacob Smith A History of Hate in Ohio: Then and Now By Michael E. Brooks and Bob Fitrakis (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 2021. Pp. vii, 243. Notes, bibliography, index. Paperbound, $24.95.) In Requiem for a Nun, author William Faulkner famously wrote: "The past is never dead. It's not even past." In A History of Hate in Ohio, Michael Brooks and Bob Fitrakis reveal a long history of hate speech and actions in Ohio that extends back hundreds of years and has a clear line to the present. Marilyn Howard begins the book with an introduction discussing important national events, like the election of Andrew Jackson and the 1876 election, that provide context for the rest of the book. While sparse in footnotes, this section is packed with information, setting the stage for the better documented chapters that follow. The book's first section, "Then," focuses on hate in Ohio from a historical perspective. As the authors aptly note, school children are often taught a "rosy, sanitized version" of Ohio history, where the North (and Ohio especially) appear in a positive light, while the South is framed negatively. The truth is far from that sanitized version of history. The book chronicles hate directed towards a variety of groups, including Indigenous people who were forced off their land, Black people, Jewish people, and Catholics. Brooks and Fitrakis provide strong evidence that early Ohio was anti-Black, drawing upon the "Black Laws" passed early in Ohio history that prevented Black Ohioans from voting and made it difficult for Black people to move to the state. This book is very dark reading and uses quotes that include disturbing words. Indeed, after the "n-word" is used in place of a direct quote on page seven, it is a bit jarring later in the book when the word is often quoted in the context of hate speech. (Readers should also know that the authors use [End Page 147] quotes containing other racial epithets to provide evidence of hate speech.) This section is impressive, covering a wide history that ends near the present. For example, Brooks notes that racist American Independence Party candidate George Wallace performed better in Ohio than in other midwestern states. The next section of the book, "Now," covers more recent Ohio (though it also reaches back into the previous period to provide relevant information). One strength of this section is that it divides the period into decades with subheadings, helping the reader understand that some of the events chronicled took place in their lifetime. Notably, while the focus of the book is mostly on people and groups that are broadly conceived as extremists, this section also discusses more "mainstream" Republican politicians. For example, Brooks and Fitrakis note that investigative reporter Russ Bellant discovered that Eastern and Central European former Nazis and fascists made financial contributions to George Voinovich's 1990 gubernatorial campaign. It would have been helpful, however, to include information about whether Voinovich returned the money and disavowed the contributors. Because this section covers the period up to the early 2020s, the authors could have provided a useful discussion of the notable political trend of Ohio gravitating toward Donald Trump in the 2016 election, and his almost equal success in the state in 2020. In total, however, this work will be of interest to anyone who wants to situate the hatred we see today in a broader history. Jacob Smith Duke University Copyright © 2022 Trustees of Indiana University

Late Holocene radiocarbon dates for the Welling site (33CS441): A multi-component site in Coshocton County, Ohio

The Welling site is a multi-component site located along the Walhonding River in east-central Ohio. Excavations conducted by Kent State University (KSU) in 1960 produced evidence for an early Paleoindian Clovis component, which appeared to be stratigraphically separated from later Holocene occupations. A number of charred wood samples were collected from the Clovis level, but, likely due to their extremely small size, there was no attempt made to obtain radiocarbon dates at the time. The recent transfer of the collection from KSU to the Ohio History Connection (OHC) provided the opportunity to reassess this material. All the samples are from deciduous species, but given the documented presence of all of the species in Late Pleistocene forests and the possibility that the sample represented only those species brought to the site for use as firewood, we selected two samples for AMS radiocarbon dating. The resulting dates indicate the wood was burned in fires during the Late Woodland and Post-Contact periods. These results provide additional evidence for the difficulty in obtaining reliable dates for Paleoindian sites.

The Indian Menace in David McCullough's The Pioneers

David McCullough has written a history of Ohio almost entirely devoid of Native history. He ignores the long and complicated history of the Northwest Indian confederacy, and their struggle to retain their homeland in the face of an aggressively expansive American republic. Instead, he imagines Ohio and the Northwest Territory as an "unsettled wilderness." And he imagines the history of Ohio as the story of the settlement of this territory by white settlers, struggling to bring "the American way of life" into the North American wilderness.

“We Have Them Whipped Here”: Lynching and the Rule of Law in Lima, Ohio

“We Have Them Whipped Here”Lynching and the Rule of Law in Lima, Ohio Perry Bush (bio) In the later nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the small industrial city of Lima, Ohio, was deeply shaken by two different incidents of racial violence. The stories of both incidents—one in 1888 and a second in 1916—are intertwined. Together they illustrate, this essay will argue, a good deal about such fundamental matters in Ohio history as Gilded Age–and Progressive Era–race relations, a cultural clash between older and newer models of justice, and the final, emerging triumph of the rule of law. Patterns of extralegal violence were not uncommon in nineteenth-century Ohio, and their emergence in Lima was not especially unique. As scholars of lynching like Michael Pfeifer make clear, extralegal violence had a history in the Midwest that predated the Civil War and accelerated after it. One scholar counted 28 lynchings in Ohio between 1856 and 1932, 45 in Illinois, and a staggering 66 in Indiana during roughly the same period.1 Such violent expressions were the surface manifestations of American racism, grinding away like cultural tectonic plates deep beneath the nation’s political/cultural surface. The same forces produced the legal structures of Jim Crow segregation—de jure in the South, de facto across much of the North and West—and the subsequent relegation of African Americans to a secondary and subordinate place in [End Page 7] American life. Indeed, it is possible to read Lima’s first episode of overt racial violence, the Election Day riot of 1888, as a local reflection of these wider cultural and legal patterns. However, it is Lima’s response to a second and more massive outbreak of racial violence—two attempted lynchings in late August 1916—that sent its history down a different channel. Certainly, the initial story proceeded along the usual channels, with a perceived sexual assault, a hate-filled mob screaming for the blood of the offender, and some authorities too cowed or overpowered to intervene. Yet at that point Lima’s story deviated from the grim and nightmarish conclusions that such narratives usually arrived at elsewhere. No bodies ended up swinging from trees or lampposts. Courts and prosecutors swung into motion and packed the ringleaders of the mob off to prison. Moreover, the events of that night became a critical turning point; these were the last such attempted lynchings in state history.2 In this manner, the story of that August night in Lima, and subsequent developments that cemented the rule of law in the state, suggests the city might yet stand as a more hopeful beacon on the bleak landscape of American racism. Over the past two or more decades, the historical scholarship of lynching has undergone a metamorphosis that casts new light on the significance of events in Lima. As late as 1990, several historians have recently argued, the field of lynching scholarship languished in “oblivion” before a new set of scholars emerged. They reinvigorated the field by pushing their explorations in new directions, both conceptually in the reconstructed South and then beyond it. A host of new analyses have appeared: of lynchings of Mexican Americans in the West and Southwest; of Latino, Asian, and working-class whites by western vigilante mobs; and of white and African American victims across the Midwest.3 A key conceptual breakthrough in recent years has been the increased attention paid to the victims of lynchings, and a more careful scholarly sifting of the various subcultures out of which both mob violence, and resistance to it, emerged.4 One of the foremost recent interpreters of American lynching has argued persuasively that its slow and final decline across the country in the later nineteenth [End Page 8] to mid-twentieth centuries represented the final triumph of the rule of law. The process was slow, uneven, and its final victory was by no means assured. The rule of law, Michael Pfiefer argues, only triumphed after a long struggle between two contending groups of political/cultural combatants. Its “due process” advocates were “lawyers, entrepreneurs, clergy, and some editors,” propelled by new humanitarian commitments and an “inclination toward social engineering.” Some of them moved...

Three Early Water-Powered Mills in Northwest Greene County, Ohio, and Their Impacts on the Landscape

Three Early Water-Powered Mills in Northwest Greene County, Ohio, and Their Impacts on the Landscape David Nolin (bio) After the Treaty of Greenville in 1795, settlers rapidly made new settlements in what is now Greene County, Ohio.1 One of the first priorities for the many new towns that began in this forest and prairie wilderness was the development of water-powered mills, small industries that utilized the constant and reliable energy source of falling water to provide vital services. This ancient technology was already heavily utilized in the eastern United States, and as new lands were settled, mills were quickly built to meet the needs of new communities.2 Millwrights, experts in the craft of constructing mills and conveying water to them, typically designed and built the mills, and millers operated them as a business. These early mills provided many services, but two of the most common and essential were sawmills and gristmills. Sawmills facilitated the conversion of trees from the hardwood forests that covered much of the land into lumber for building materials. Early sawmills were typically small operations run by one or two people. A frame containing one or more vertically mounted saws was attached to a crank, which was turned by a waterwheel. These mills could cut about 3,000 feet of lumber in a working day, some 20 to 25 times more efficient than two men working in [End Page 51] a saw pit and using a whipsaw.3 The first sawmill appeared in Ohio in 1789, and by 1840, there were 2,883 of them operating in the state. A thorough examination of early Ohio sawmills was published in the Ohio History journal in 1975.4 Click for larger view View full resolution Location of eighteenth-century mills and millraces on Hebble Creek, Bath Township, Greene County, plotted on USGS topographical map. The first gristmill appeared in Ohio in 1790, and by 1840, there were 1,861 of them in Ohio, providing the vital service of grinding grain harvested from agricultural fields between two round millstones, converting it to flour for bread and other staples.5 In early mills, a vertical waterwheel powered one or more sets of millstones or “buhrs” that could grind 10 to 12 bushels of grain per hour.6 After 1860, many gristmills replaced their vertical waterwheels with more efficient turbines. By the 1880s, most millstone systems were being [End Page 52] replaced by a new innovation, the roller system, using steel or ceramic cylinders that ground the grain against a flat plate. Roller mills had the ability to separate the bran from the germ, allowing the collection and sale of white flour. By the 1900s, the availability of engines powered by inexpensive fossil fuels eliminated the need for water power and the upkeep of water-wheels, millponds, and millraces, and many water-powered mills that could not compete were abandoned. The number of water-powered gristmills in Ohio dropped from 1,181 in 1870 to 94 in 1922.7 A comprehensive study of Ohio gristmills, their technological evolution, their rapid increase on Ohio streams, and their subsequent decrease was thoroughly examined in Water-wheels and Millstones: A History of Ohio Gristmills and Milling. The first step for an early millwright was to identify a location or “seat” where the proposed mill could be successful.8 A seat required that a steady flow of water be available that could be conducted to the mill. A millpond was usually established upstream of the mill where a valley contained a natural constriction that could be impounded by a dam made of wood and/or stone.9 The raised water level provided the stored energy to power the mill. Water was diverted from the millpond by a head race, a dug channel, or a wooden trough that conveyed the water to a waterwheel, which turned the mill machinery. After turning the waterwheel, the water was sped back to the source stream via a dug channel called a tailrace. On a relatively swift stream, the head races and tailraces could be quite short, and these streams were the most favorable for mills. For instance, between 1798 and 1875, 11 gristmills, five sawmills, and...

New Evidence Pertaining to an Alleged Hopewell Mobiliary Clay Human Figurine

Abstract Additional information has been identified concerning a fired-clay human figurine analyzed and reported by Bebber and colleagues (2018). Despite this figurine having been discovered within a box labeled “Hopewell Figurine—Hopeton Earthworks,” they argue against a Hopewellian affiliation based on Thermoluminescence (TL) dating, a comparative study, and the inability to firmly establish the specimen’s provenience. A rediscovered letter from Olaf Prufer offers a new site of origin and a more complete chain of custody, which is partially corroborated by photographs curated at the Ohio History Connection and a 1925 Boston Evening Transcript article. With this new information, we dispute Bebber and colleagues’ (2018) interpretation of the figurine’s acquisition, its alleged site of origin, and the conclusions of their comparative analysis. This case study does not support their call for more rigorous authentication of collector-acquired objects; rather, it documents the difficulty in reestablishing the provenience of objects once they have become disassociated.

Frank Press, A life of magnitude

Frank Press, 19th president of the National Academy of Sciences, died on Wednesday, January 29, 2020, at his home in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, at the age of 95. His career spanned the golden age of postwar science, and its arc took him to the highest levels of leadership in academia and government. Frank served in many roles with great distinction and is remembered for his sharp intellect and steady leadership and for his self-composure, fair-mindedness, and good judgment. Few scientists of the past century have had such an enduring impact on United States science policy and the organization of the federal scientific enterprise. Frank Press. Image credit: Ohio History Connection/Joseph Munroe. Frank was born in New York City, the child of Russian emigres, graduating from the Samuel J. Tilden High School in the East Flatbush section of Brooklyn in 1941. He received his bachelor’s degree in physics from the City College of New York in 1944 and enrolled as a graduate student at Columbia University. Frank married Billie Kallick in 1946, when he was 21 years old. She was the love of his life and constant companion until her death in 2009. At Columbia, Frank studied sound propagation in oceans under the supervision of the geophysicist and oceanographer Maurice “Doc” Ewing. He received his doctorate in 1949, the same year that Ewing founded the Lamont Geological Observatory on a cliff overlooking the Hudson River. With generous funding from the Defense Department, Ewing and his two assistant professors, Frank and Joe Worzel, quickly developed Lamont into a world-class research laboratory. Frank learned a lot from Ewing’s hard-driving style and quoted his advice, “Make a better instrument or measure in a place where no one else has been and a great discovery will come your way.” Following this dictum, Frank expanded … [↵][1]1Email: tjordan{at}usc.edu. [1]: #xref-corresp-1-1

Romance, Rejection, and Idealism: The Illini, the Midwest, and the Peace Corps

Research Article| April 01 2020 Romance, Rejection, and Idealism: The Illini, the Midwest, and the Peace Corps Douglas A. Dixon Douglas A. Dixon Douglas A. Dixon is the author of Beyond Truman: Robert H. Ferrell and Crafting the Past (Rowman & Littlefield). He served in the US Foreign Service and on the faculties of several universities. His articles have appeared in popular and academic publications, most recently, “Elementary Lessons of Hoosier Peace Corps Volunteers” in Traces of Indiana and Midwestern History. and “True Conservatives in Fifities America,” Ohio History Journal. Dixon resides in Austin, Texas. Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society (1998-) (2020) 113 (1): 67–86. https://doi.org/10.5406/jillistathistsoc.113.1.0067 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Permissions Search Site Citation Douglas A. Dixon; Romance, Rejection, and Idealism: The Illini, the Midwest, and the Peace Corps. Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society (1998-) 1 January 2020; 113 (1): 67–86. doi: https://doi.org/10.5406/jillistathistsoc.113.1.0067 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All Scholarly Publishing CollectiveUniversity of Illinois PressJournal of the Illinois State Historical Society (1998-) Search Advanced Search The text of this article is only available as a PDF. Copyright 2020 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois2020 Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

The Finger Saga

The Wood County (Ohio) Historical Center and Museum has struggled with how to treat a controversial artifact a long time in its possession: a set of severed human fingers in a jar. Collected from a murder scene in 1881, “The Fingers in the Jar” have become a popular piece of the museum’s collection but for problematic reasons. This article traces the artifact’s life from creation to lurid objectification and proposes a new interpretation that recognizes its profound moral value. Such provocative exhibits can generate critical moral reflection and thus the museum is exploring ways to present these controversial human remains despite ethical concerns. Displaying them in a humanizing, pedagogically sound way fits squarely within the museum’s updated mission to promote social justice. The museum can offer a pathway toward public education on domestic homicide in all its brutality, historically and today.

Analyses of organic residue from a conical pipe from the Niles-Wolford Mound (33Pi3), Pickaway County, Ohio

The Niles-Wolford Mound (33Pi3) was a conical Adena burial mound located along the Scioto River in Jackson Township, Pickaway County, Ohio. Excavations conducted in 1955 by the Ohio History Connection resulted in the discovery of a subfloor tomb with three burials. A tubular pipe found in association with one of the burials contained charred organic residue. Macrobotonical analysis of the material identified root or bark within the sample. Liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) analyses detected the presence of various compounds, including an alkaloid. Radiocarbon dating places the mound to circa 2120 ± 30 BP. This research furthers our understanding of the timing, geographical extent, and ceremonial contexts of prehistoric plant tobacco use by the Adena culture and demonstrates the importance of museum collections for addressing such questions.

American Antiquities: Revisiting the Origins of American Archaeology. Terry A.Barnhart. lincoln: university of nebraska press, 2016. 572 pp .

Museum AnthropologyVolume 40, Issue 2 p. 170-172 Book Review American Antiquities: Revisiting the Origins of American Archaeology. Terry A. Barnhart. lincoln: university of nebraska press, 2016. 572pp. Bradley T. Lepper, Bradley T. Lepper Ohio History ConnectionSearch for more papers by this author Bradley T. Lepper, Bradley T. Lepper Ohio History ConnectionSearch for more papers by this author First published: 21 September 2017 https://doi.org/10.1111/muan.12150Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat Volume40, Issue2Fall 2017Pages 170-172 RelatedInformation

Classroom Reflections from the Ohio Valley

Classroom Reflections from the Ohio Valley Eric Froese I approach teaching the American Civil War to my middle school students by immersing them in the experiences of the conflict as it relates to the middle of the nineteenth century. I have to set the stage, actually trying to put them into the environment of the period. I can do this with all the resources that are out there for educators. The Internet and resources provided by great organizations have made lesson planning easier. I utilize the textbook, not a primary resource, only for a concise overview of the conflict. It is the starting point, the hook, to set the interest in a war that tore the country apart. The use of many outside resources reels them in for the duration of the war. After each class, I leave them wanting more. I leave them asking “What will we learn tomorrow?” To meet the students’ expectations of learning more, I spend a lot of time researching and reading resources on not only the Civil War but history in general. The substance of my Civil War unit is the many outside resources I bring into the classroom; I use a wide range of primary and secondary sources. The most difficult part of planning how to teach the Civil War is deciding where to start the timeline and making sure I can get all the material taught in the available time. Where do I start? The beginning, for me, is the Missouri Compromise of 1820, Congress’s attempts to deal with the issue of slavery, maintaining the balance of power within the Senate. I then teach about the abolitionist movement and the protests over slavery and the Underground Railroad, the Compromise of 1850, with the Fugitive Slave Law—as the passions begin to heat up on both sides, eventually leading to the Civil War. Slave revolts, Bleeding Kansas, and John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry follow as the embers of conflict begin to boil over. The concluding event of part 1 of my war unit is the Confederates’ firing on Fort Sumter. Part 2 is the war, the advantages and disadvantages of both sides, the North’s strategy for victory, the southern plan to fight a war for independence, and the [End Page 69] people involved in the war. I focus not only on the main leaders but also on the soldiers. We discuss the battles, the successes and failures of sides, the lack or loss of strong military leaders, legislation, and important speeches. The role of African Americans in the war has greatly increased in my classroom, now that I have seen presentations by Hari Jones, assistant director and curator of the African American Civil War Memorial and Museum. The information he has given to educators is awesome. Also, I recently added the home front to my plans. Until a teacher institute I attended in 2014, I did not put much emphasis on the home front. Since then, I have added more on the home front. The Ohio Historical Society has a replica of a town from the mid-1850s on its property. As institute attendees, we were given the opportunity to spend many hours in the village, learning from the people of the town. Each character in the town worked from a prepared script for the events of the period. There were a storeowner, a pharmacist, a doctor, and many others who shared their ideas and feelings on the climate of the United States in the 1850s and ‘60s. This year when I teach the Civil War, I will be able to use what I learned and show my students the photos of the town and the people. The final emphasis of study is on the ending of the war, Appomattox, the assassination of Lincoln, and Reconstruction—what happens now the physical fighting has ended. We study the development of military districts and the constitutional amendments giving freed African Americans rights as citizens of the country. We also deal with the evils of discrimination and bigotry that developed after the war. Before I begin teaching about the Civil War, I focus on the background information on the North and the...

The State of Ohio History: A Roundtable Discussion

The State of Ohio HistoryA Roundtable Discussion Gregory S. Wilson (bio), L. Diane Barnes (bio), Kevin F. Kern (bio), David J. Merkowitz (bio), and Donna M. DeBlasio (bio) introduction Gregory S. Wilson This past year, I challenged a talented group of colleagues to consider the state of Ohio history and present their ideas at the Ohio Academy of History annual meeting in 2015. I meant for us to contemplate both research about Ohio, as well how we teach and present that history in Ohio’s schools and its public history settings. Happily, they accepted. Stemming from that conversation, L. Diane Barnes commissioned the following set of essays for publication here. Several things prompted my concern, and many of them are described in the following pages. My colleague at the University of Akron, Kevin F. Kern, and I coauthored a new state history of Ohio, and I thought it might be an opportune moment to step back and examine how we tell the story of a state, and whether telling that story remained important and useful, or even just plain interesting.1 Many years into the “cultural turn” in the discipline of history, and with more attention paid to global and transnational histories, [End Page 7] whither the focus on something so seemingly trite as a state, let alone Ohio, an entity rarely associated outside the state with anything besides blandness, deindustrialization, and football? I had wondered, too, how the teaching of Ohio’s history fared both in the public schools and at the college level. Having worked with teachers from across Ohio, as well as history professionals working outside academe, I also thought it wise to consider how Ohio’s history is faring in public history settings across the state. What stories, if any, are we telling—and hearing—about Ohio’s history? The results of these musings are the ideas, questions, and suggestions penned below from L. Diane Barnes, Kevin F. Kern, David J. Merkowitz, and Donna M. DeBlasio. I thank each of them for their contributions. Together, they demonstrate that the people of Ohio remain interested in history generally and in the history of Ohio in particular. But they caution us, in various ways, to be alert for just how and why that history is being used, threats to history as a professional subject and discipline, and how it is being taught and studied. To paraphrase a famous quotation, the price of critically engaged, supported, and relevant history is eternal vigilance. Together these essays highlight the past foundation of Ohio history and offer important pleas for new directions in the study, teaching, and presentation of Ohio’s rich, compelling, and important history. part i: the ohio history journal L. Diane Barnes As editor of the Ohio History journal, I have been thinking a lot about state history and whether it has outlived its usefulness as a category of study, perspective, and analysis. I think maybe it has, at least in its current practice. The ways that state history has been conceived and approached in the last fifty years (maybe one hundred years) has changed little. This failure of practitioners of Ohio history to keep up with the times created an impression of the field as anachronistic and backward looking. Scholarly submissions to the journal have remained fairly constant and centered around just a few subjects: state politics and politicians, state development and infrastructure, and war, with a little of abolitionism, civil rights, and the Kent State shootings thrown in for good measure. This persistent trend continues today, and I am as guilty as earlier editors of maintaining [End Page 8] the old guard. A recent volume, for example, included a cogent essay exploring the influence of Thomas Jefferson’s 1801 religious liberty letter to the Danbury, Connecticut, Baptists on the framers of the 1803 Ohio Constitution. Another examined James A. Garfield’s front-porch campaign for the presidency, while a third considered the intersection of slavery, race, and regional identity in Ohio during the early republic.2 Excellent scholarship drove all of these essays, and the historiography of the state advanced in each area; however, these same subjects might have appeared in the Ohio History of a...

1950s: Building the American Dream, Columbus, Ohio Historical Center, Ohio History Connection

1950s: Building the American Dream, Columbus, Ohio Historical Center, Ohio History Connection

Remembrance: Andrew R. L. Cayton: Midwesterner, 1954–2015

RemembranceAndrew R. L. Cayton: Midwesterner, 1954–2015 Jon K. Lauck Last spring, at Grand Valley State University in Grand Rapids, Michigan, the historian Andrew R. L. Cayton participated in a panel discussion at the first annual history conference of the newly organized Midwestern History Association. Cayton held forth on the future of the field of midwestern studies, which he had done so much to lead for over two decades. He offered smart advice, gentle reminders, historical perspective, important warnings, and some grand plans. Little did the assembled participants know that Drew, as he was widely known, would soon be diagnosed with colon cancer and that his Michigan remarks would be one of the final times he would offer his thoughts on the Midwest and its history. Drew was about as midwestern as it was possible to be. Born in Cincinnati, he mostly grew up in Marietta, Ohio, where the Muskingum River drains into the Ohio River, which forms the southern boundary of the Midwest. Marietta was the first town established in the Northwest Territory by the Americans after the revolution forced the British to cede the future Midwest to its rebellious colony. Drew’s father was head of the library at Marietta College and his mother taught art at the local high school. Although he took an expansive view of midwestern history and the various histories contained therein, including the darker stories, Drew recalled his youth in Marietta with great fondness and said he believed “strongly in the basic values associated with that world: family, respectability, mutual respect, and integrity, what my mother used to call character.” After graduating from high school in Marietta in 1972, Drew went to the University of Virginia, where he earned his ba in 1976. At Virginia, he decided to pursue academic history instead of becoming a high school teacher because he read Ray Allen Billington’s biography of Frederick Jackson Turner. He also met Mary Kupiec during his second year of college at Virginia [End Page 201] and they were married in August 1975. Later followed his daughter Elizabeth Renanne, who was born in November 1984, and his daughter Hannah Kupiec, who was born in July 1988. After graduating from Virginia, Drew and Mary moved north to Brown University, where he studied for his Ph.D. under the famous historian of the American Revolution, Gordon Wood, and Mary earned her Ph.D. in American Civilization. Not surprisingly, Drew’s doctoral research focused on the era of the revolution and its implications for frontier Ohio. His dissertation-turned-book was published under the title Frontier Republic: Ideology and Politics in the Ohio Country, 1780–1825 (Kent State University Press, 1986) and reflected the influence of Wood’s research on the political culture and thought of the revolutionary era. Drew followed with a collection about early Ohio politics, coedited with Jeffrey Brown, entitled The Pursuit of Public Power: Political Culture in Ohio, 1788–1861 (Kent State University Press, 1994). During this time period, Drew was also thinking about the development of the Midwest in conjunction with the bicentennial of the Northwest Ordinance, the foundational statute which shaped the history of the Midwest. This led to Drew’s book with Peter Onuf entitled The Midwest and the Nation: Rethinking the History of an American Region (Indiana University Press, 1990), which offered an exhaustive review of the relevant literature on the Midwest and several conceptualizations of how the Midwest had been viewed in other eras. About the time of the publication of The Midwest and the Nation and after teaching at Harvard (1980–82), Wellesley (1981–82), and Ball State (1982–90), Drew settled down in his home state of Ohio and took a post in the history department at Miami University, where Mary was already teaching. Miami University, appropriately enough, was founded in 1809 during the earliest stages of the Ohio history that Drew had mastered and would share with the world through his books. Drew’s work on the Midwest continued apace at Miami, where he would teach for twenty-five years. He served as coeditor of Miami’s regionally focused journal The Old Northwest: A Journal of Regional Life and Letters for a half...

Collaborating with the Army Corps to Protect the Village of Zoar

Collaborating with the Army Corps to Protect the Village of Zoar Will Cook (bio) and Jennifer Sandy (bio) Historic preservationists and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers may seem like unlikely allies, but they often find themselves in close association nonetheless. Here we explore a successful collaboration between preservation advocates and the Army Corps—one of the most influential agencies in implementing the federal government’s stewardship responsibilities for cultural resources. ABOUT THE U.S. ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS Historic Beginnings Today’s Army Corps has a deep and significant history in the development of the United States. Its roots date back to June 16, 1775, when the Continental Congress organized an army that included one chief engineer and two assistants. This early “ancestor” group grew under Gen. George Washington and is credited with building the Revolutionary War fortifications at Bunker Hill near Boston.1 The Army Corps as we know it today owes its creation to President Thomas Jefferson, who established its headquarters and training facilities at West Point. During the Civil War the Corps built forts, trenches, bridges, batteries and transportation mechanisms—all of which aided the Union Army’s victory. During World War II, the Corps assisted U.S. interests overseas by building bridges and maintaining roads needed for troops to advance into Germany. At home, the Corps constructed the numerous buildings and structures of the three Manhattan Project sites, now listed together in the National Register of Historic Places and one of the National Trust’s National Treasures.2 Expanding Role By the outset of World War II, the Corps was well on its way to being a leader in constructing and managing hydroelectric power. After World War II, the work of the Army Corps included expanded efforts in civil activities—surveying road and canal routes, dredging sandbars in the Ohio and Mississippi [End Page 8] rivers, building coastal fortifications, and charting navigational routes. It eventually became the nation’s federal flood control agency. It also became the nation’s leading provider of hydroelectric power and recreation areas, assumed added responsibilities for natural disaster response, and, in the 1960s, took on a leading role in preserving and restoring natural areas. Click for larger view View full resolution Mayor Larry Bell welcomes attendees at the Zoar Garden for the June 2012 announcement of Zoar’s inclusion in the list of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places. PHOTO COURTESY HERITAGE OHIO Click for larger view View full resolution Preservation partners gather at a Section 106 meeting in November 2012, including the Army Corps, Village of Zoar, Zoar Community Association, Ohio History Connection, Heritage Ohio, Ohio and Erie Canalway coalition, Governor Kasick’s office, and the National Trust. PHOTO COURTESY OF THE OHIO HISTORY CONNECTION Current Structure and Organization Today, the Army Corps employs more than 36,500 civilian employees and military personnel. With a staff of this size, it has become one of the largest public engineering, design and construction agencies in the world. Consequently, understanding how the Corps works is no easy task. Headquartered in Arlington, Virginia, at the Pentagon, the Corps’ national headquarters office is responsible for overall policy and plans for all Corps initiatives, including civil works, military readiness for the Army and Air Force, worldwide contingency operations, and the global war on terrorism. The Chief of Engineers—the head official of the Corps—is supported by three deputies. They are further supported by one director who leads Military Programs and another director who leads Civil Works. The Corps is further divided geographically into nine divisions. THE ARMY CORPS AND HISTORIC PRESERVATION For many preservationists, the Army Corps’ connection to historic preservation is not immediately apparent. With a stated mission to [End Page 9] “[d]eliver vital public and military engineering services; partnering in peace and war to strengthen our Nation’s security, energize the economy and reduce risks from disasters,” it would seem that the Army Corps’ work is limited to military-type engineering projects. Nothing could be further from the truth. The Corps has the largest workforce in the federal government with more than 200 specialists in a broad range of disciplines, including a Center of Expertise in Historic Structures and...