Ashtabula County, Ohio

Ashtabula County History, Geography, Demographics, Cities and Towns, and Education

County Seat: Jefferson
Year Organized: 1807
Square Miles: 703

Court House:

25 West Jefferson Street
County Courthouse
Jefferson, OH 44047-1027

Etymology - Origin of County Name

The county is named for an Indian word for fish.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

History

Ashtabula County formed on February 10, 1807. It was the first county created in the Western Reserve. The county is named for an Indian word for fish. In 1796, Moses Cleaveland traveled through Ashtabula County on his way to establish the city of Cleveland for the Connecticut Land Company. Five of Cleaveland's traveling companions, James Kingsbury and his wife and three children, remained behind in what would become Ashtabula County. Mrs. Kingsbury gave birth to the first known white child in the Connecticut Western Reserve during the winter of 1796-1797.

Ashtabula County is located in the northeastern corner of Ohio and covers almost 703 square miles. The county has experienced a small decline in population, losing 2.9 percent of its 102,360 residents between 1995 and 2000. Ashtabula is the largest community in the county, with almost twenty-one thousand residents in 2000. The county seat of Jefferson ranks a distant fourth in size, with just over 3,300 residents in 2002. The county averages 146 residents per square mile. It also has more covered bridges than any other Ohio county.

Ashtabula County is overwhelmingly rural, but most residents earn their livings by working in manufacturing, sales, or service positions. Many people work in the shipping industry, transferring coal, iron ore, and steel across the Great Lakes. The county's average income was approximately 21,700 dollars per person in 1999, with just over thirteen percent of the population living in poverty.

Most voters in Ashtabula County claim to be independents, yet in recent years, they have supported Democratic candidates at the national level by a small margin.

Among the county's more famous residents are Betsy Cowles, an early women's rights advocate, and Joshua Giddings and Benjamin Wade, two of the earliest and most powerful Republicans during the 1850s, 1860s, and 1870s. Platt R. Spencer, the inventor of Spencerian writing, also was born here.

Sources

Ashtabula County Ohio History Central, July 23, 2008,

http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/entry.php?rec=1892&nm=Ashtabula-County

Neighboring Counties:

Across Lake Erie lies Elgin and Norfolk Counties, Ontario, Canada (north)
Erie County, Pennsylvania (northeast)
Crawford County, Pennsylvania (east)
Trumbull County (south)
Geauga County (southwest)
Lake County (west)

Cities and Towns:

- Andover	village	Incorporated Area
- Ashtabula	city	Incorporated Area
- Austinburg	township
- Cherry Valley	township
- Colebrook	township
- Conneaut	city	Incorporated Area
- Denmark	township
- Dorset	township
- Geneva	city	Incorporated Area
- Geneva-on-the-Lake	village	Incorporated Area
- Harpersfield	township
- Hartsgrove	township
- Jefferson (County Seat)	village	Incorporated Area
- Kingsville	township
- Lenox	township
- Morgan	township
- New Lyme	township
- North Kingsville	village	Incorporated Area
- Orwell	village	Incorporated Area
- Pierpont	township
- Roaming Shores	village	Incorporated Area
- Rock Creek	village	Incorporated Area
- Rome	village	Incorporated Area
- Saybrook	township
- Trumbull	township
- Wayne	village	Incorporated Area
- Williamsfield	township
- Windsor	township

County Resources:

Enter County Resources and Information Here

County Resource Guide

Counties: US Map

The history of our nation can be seen as a prolonged struggle to define the relative roles and powers of our governments: federal, state, and local. And the names we've given our counties, our most locally based jurisdictions, reflects the "characteristic features of our country!"

But age, size and colorful names of our counties isn't the only reason to explore counties' role in American history, or the history of county government itself. In fact, the story of county government reflects the larger meanings of American history.

Today's counties are the most flexible, locally responsive and creative governments in the US. They are the most diverse, varying in size, population, geography, and governmental structure. In their politics and policies, they express a 1990's political slogan "Think globally, act locally."

Penn Foster High School

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