Description: This image shows Main Street in Ravenna, Ohio. The Portage County Courthouse sits at this intersection of Main and Chestnut Streets. In front of the courthouse is a large green. The Savings and Loan building located at 100 E. Main St. is now Fifth Federal Mortgage. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AV101_B01F05_402
Subjects: Streets--Ohio; Stores and shops; Automobiles; Small business--Ohio; City and town life
Places: Ravenna (Ohio); Portage County (Ohio);
 

Description: Newspaper article on a commandment of Mormonism, written by Symonds Ryder in the Ohio Star, January 5, 1832. The Ohio Star was published in Ravenna, Ohio. Ryder was a Vermont native who settled in Hiram, Ohio, in 1815, and took up the Mormon faith around 1830. He eventually left the religion. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL06772
Subjects: Newspapers; Multicultural Ohio--Religion in Ohio; Religion in Ohio
Places: Ravenna (Ohio); Portage County (Ohio)
 

Description: Dated ca. 1880-1900, these are advertisements for coach and hearse models from Merts & Riddle Coach and Hearse Company in Ravenna, Ohio. The first page features an Improved No. 9, page 2 features No. 70 and includes a description which reads "This cut represents our medium size Funeral Car. It has finest quality polished French plate glass; hammer cloth on seat, black broad-cloth lambrequin curtains, trimmed with heavy black silk fringe and tassels; large, hand carved wood center urn on top; late style silver-plated inside drop rails, with bouquet holders. Table plates, table rollers, bier pins, hub-caps, hub-bands, seat rail and pole crab, silver-plated; elegant silver lamps; best Collinge axles; best oil-tempered Swede steel springs and best steel tire. Foot rug, pole straps and wrench, " and provides its dimensions. Page 3 advertises Improved No. 132, page 4 No. 136, and page 5 No. 236. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: MSS1606A_B01F15_009
Subjects: Ravenna (Ohio); Carriages & coaches; Ohio Economy--Economy--Business; Funeral industry; Funeral vehicles; Advertisements
Places: Ravenna (Ohio); Portage County (Ohio)
 

Description: Dated ca. 1880-1900, these are advertisements for coach and hearse models from Merts & Riddle Coach and Hearse Company in Ravenna, Ohio. The first page features a No. 857 model with text to either side which reads "Builders of Fine Funeral Cars and Funeral Coaches, Broughams, Landaus, Palace Pall Bearers' Coaches, Berlin Coaches and Coupes." The text below the image reads "New Styles! Handsome Designs! Silver grey funeral cars a specialty; a large Stock of finished work constantly on hand to select from. Also some excellent second-hand Hearses, Landaus, Coaches, Broughams, Coupes, etc. Correspondence solicited." Page 2 advertises model No. 887, a back funeral car, page 3 No. 83, page 4 No. 356, and page 5 No. 479. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: MSS1606A_B01F16_857
Subjects: Ravenna (Ohio); Carriages & coaches; Ohio Economy--Economy--Business; Funeral industry; Funeral vehicles; Advertisements
Places: Ravenna (Ohio); Portage County (Ohio)
 

Description: The first hearses were horse-drawn wagons. The one seen in this image collected by the Ohio Federal Writers' Project is made with plate-glass sides designed to display the coffin, full Clarence (circular glass front and end), and four urns atop the carriage. A popular Ohio hearse maker of the time was Merts & Riddle Coach & Hearse Company located in Ravenna, Ohio. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B02F10_005_1
Subjects: Chillicothe (Ross County, Ohio)--History; Funeral customs and rites; Ravenna (Ohio)--History--Pictorial works
Places: Ross County (Ohio)
 

Description: Harriet Taylor Upton was born in 1853 in Ravenna, Ohio. In 1880, her father, Judge Ezra B. Taylor, was elected as a Republican representative to Congress. Harriet accompanied her widowed father to Washington, D.C., where she served as his hostess and companion. In Washington, she met George Upton and they were married in 1884. While living in Washington, Upton became involved in the women's suffrage movement. In 1890, she joined the National American Woman Suffrage Association, and was elected treasurer in 1894, an office she held until 1910. Upton also served as president of the Ohio Woman Suffrage Association from 1899 to 1908 and again from 1911 to 1920. A life-long member of the Republican Party, Upton became the first woman to serve on the Republican National Executive Committee, in 1920. She ran unsuccessfully for the United States House of Representatives in 1926. Harriet Taylor Upton died in 1945 in Pasadena, California, at the age of 90. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SC2850
Subjects: Upton, Harriet Taylor; Suffrage--Ohio; Suffragists; Social reformers
Places: Ravenna (Ohio); Portage County (Ohio); Washington (District of Columbia);
 

Description: Photographic reproduction of a portrait of Benjamin Tappan (1773-1857). Tappan founded the Ohio city of Ravenna on June 11, 1799. He was also a U.S. senator, founder of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio, an active abolitionist, and the president of the Ohio Canal Commission. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL02974
Subjects: Tappan, Benjamin, 1773-1857; Legislators--United States; Abolitionists
 

Description: This photograph shows suffragist Harriet Taylor Upton giving a speech in Newbury, Ohio, to a group of women on August 23, 1919. Upton (1854-1945) was born in Ravenna, Ohio, and lived much of her life in Warren, Ohio. She served as treasurer of the National Woman's Suffrage Association and coordinated the business of the association from her home in Warren from 1903 to 1910. In 1918, Upton became the first woman appointed to the Warren Board of Education. After the 19th Amendment was passed, giving women the right to vote in 1920, Upton became the first woman to serve as vice chairman of the National Executive Committee and made an unsuccessful run for Congress. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: Om1532_1499540_038
Subjects: Ohio Women; Presidents and Politics; Civil Liberties; Suffrage; Suffragists; Ohio League of Women Voters; Upton, Harriet Taylor
Places: Newbury (Ohio); Geauga County (Ohio)
 

Description: Harriet Taylor Upton speaking at the Ohio Statehouse before a large crowd, Columbus, Ohio, 1914. Harriet Taylor Upton was born on December 17, 1853, in Ravenna, Ohio. She emerged as a leading women's rights advocate by the early 1890s, and was the first woman to serve on the Republican National Executive Committee. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL03862
Subjects: Women--Ohio; Women's rights; Upton, Harriet Taylor; Suffrage--Ohio; Suffragists
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: Charles Morgan of Portage County, Legally Executed at 1:20 A.M., August 3, 1888, for the murder of Detective Hilligan at Ravenna, Ohio, while being returned from Pittsburgh, Pa., to answer a charge of Burglary at Cleveland, Ohio. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AL08031
Subjects: Ohio History--State and Local Government--Law; Prisons--Ohio; Death row; Capital punishment--Ohio; Portrait photography
 

Description: Banner was taken from the catafalque carrying the body of President James A. Garfield in the funeral procession in Chicago, Illinois, on September 26, 1881. This rectangular banner is made of gray wool and has black painted letters that read "In Memoriam James Abram Garfield Sage, Statesman, Patriot, Born Nov. 19th A.D. 1831 - Died Sept. 19th A.D. 1881. Requiescat in Pace." A catafalque is an ornamental platform often used for state funerals. David Garfield Stockman of Ravenna, Ohio, donated this banner to the Ohio Historical Society in 1926. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: H65046_001
Subjects: United States presidents; Monuments and memorials; Banners
 

Description: The Portage County courthouse was completed in 1960 by architect C.G. Kistler, and the building is Modernist. Its location in the public square and engraved title are the only things that set it apart as the county courthouse rather than a large office building. This image shows the front facade of the building. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: AV101_B01F05_399
Subjects: Courthouses--Ohio; flat roofs; picture windows; squares (open spaces); Modernist
Places: Ravenna (Ohio); Portage County (Ohio); 203 W. Main St.