How Cincinnati’s Marriage Picnic Connects to the 1884 Courthouse Riot
Here's what happened to the three couples that wed during the 1879 Marriage Picnic, including one couple's connection to Cincinnati’s 1884 Courthouse Riot.
How Caroline Shawk Brooks Became a National Butter Sculpture Sensation in the Late 1800s
After her husband's cotton crop failed in 1867, she looked to butter as a way to maintain a steady income.
Who Set the Bomb at St. Xavier Church?
A Cincinnati election in 1875 fanned anti-Catholic flames and a newspaper war, and might have led to a downtown church attack.
Cincinnati’s Gas Company Blocked Natural Gas for Decades
Andy Hickenlooper demonstrated the power of monopolies back in the late 1800s and early 1900s with his Cincinnati Gas & Electric Company.
In 1887, Cincinnati Fans Really Did Try to Kill the Umpire
On one hot August day in 1887, Cincinnati Red Stockings fans got so riled up the umpire had to flee for his life and only a police escort saved him.
These Vintage April Fools Day Tricks Show How Casually Cruel Our Ancestors Could Be
How far back did Cincinnati endure April Fools hoaxes? Pretty far back, as it turns out—all the way to 1849.
Cincinnati’s 1878 Quarantine Saved Thousands of Lives
A strict lockdown of travel and shipping earned Cincinnati’s Health Commissioner, Thomas C. Minor, short-term scorn and long-term gratitude.
Cincinnati Once Declared ‘No Irish Need Apply’
Irish immigrants were held in the same low regard as freed slaves in the decades following the Civil War.
Ohio Tried to Ban D.W. Griffith’s Epic ‘Birth of a Nation’
State censors objected not only to the insidious portrayal of African Americans in the film itself, but to the film’s inflammatory potential to incite racial unrest in Ohio.
Eliza Potter Styled Cincinnati’s Hair, Then Printed All The Gossip
She was an African American who published a book at a time when most were enslaved and, in many states, it was illegal to be taught how to read and write.
