Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Below: 2 old photos and papers from 1918 on and old-book passages.
The Ohio post office opened in 1839, the earliest record of the town by name. Five smaller post offices, West Brunswick (1830), Wilmurt (1839) and Graysville (1850), opened inside today’s town and later closed.
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
Ohio had its own post office from 1839 to 1954. Five other post offices opened and closed inside today’s town.
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Ohio’s history is told.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
In the archiveGreat Lakes Naval Training School band marching on Euclid Ave., April 6th 1918, ClevelandFrom Wikipedia’s history of Ohio.
The town of Ohio was established as the town of West Brunswick in 1823 from part of the town of Norway. The name was changed to Ohio in 1836. That same year, a portion of the town was annexed to the now defunct town of Wilmurt.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Passages that mention Ohio, cut from the printed page as they were published.
At this time the battle flag of the Twenty-second Alabama Infantry, and most of the men of that regiment, were captured by the One Hundred and Twenty-first Ohio, but with great losses to that command; for five officers and seventeen men were killed, and seven officers and seventy men wounded. Governor David Tod, of Ohio, acknowledged the receipt of the flag of the Twenty-second Alabama, as a trophy of the valor of the One Hundred and Twenty-first Ohio, and returned his own with the thanks of the loyal people of Ohio.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
''Ross next came into the family of Ohio counties. Nathaniel Massie, a surveyor in the employ of Virginia, had laid out the town of Manchester, in 1790, and induced people to emigrate to it. Massie had become a large land owner, and circulated glowing descriptions of the country along the Scioto, with the hope of inducing settlements. Robert J. Finley, and a Presbyterian congregation from Kentucky, were attracted, and a settlement was made at the mouth of Paint creek. Chillicothe was
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
One decade in the archive so far: the 1910s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Ohio’s page.
Retake this view · +15Nobody well known was born in Ohio itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
The Ohio post office opened in 1839, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →
From Wikimedia Commons (1), the Library of Congress (1), Wikipedia, the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
1919
