Here are 30 Interesting Ohio facts.
1-5 Ohio Facts
1. The “Holbrook Holiday” is a creative punishment invented by an Ohio judge. Instead of a standard jail term, he takes a holiday away from the criminal for the next several years by making them report to jail for the holiday. – Source
2. The state of Ohio gives out different colored license plates for those convicted of DUI. – Source
3. The city of Cincinnati, Ohio has a subway system that was built, never used, and left abandoned. – Source
4. In 1895, there were only two cars in the entire state of Ohio but they still managed to crash into each other. – Source
5. In the middle of the Great Depression, a man placed an offer in an Ohio newspaper, saying: If you’re in trouble, write to me. Many people sent him desperate letters, needing things like shoes, a coat, mercy, food, and to save their family from despair. And back came checks, under a pseudonym. – Source
6-10 Ohio Facts
6. The zoo in Toledo, Ohio was created when a baby bear was donated to the city in 1900. The bear turned out to be an adult woodchuck. – Source
7. In 1986, the United Way released 1.5 million balloons in Cleveland as a publicity stunt. It clogged the land and waterways of NE Ohio, shut down an airport runway, and forced the Coast Guard to suspend a search and rescue of 2 men who ended up drowning. – Source
8. Ohio and Michigan “went to war” in 1835 in a border dispute called the Toledo War. No one was killed, but one man got stabbed. – Source
9. Ohio was formally and retroactively admitted to the Union in 1953 after it was noted Congress had skipped a step in the process 150 years prior. – Source
10. The first speeding ticket for an automobile driver was given by a policeman in Dayton, Ohio, in 1904, to Harry Myers for going 12 miles per hour on West Third Street. – Source
11-15 Ohio Facts
11. There was a fire at Ohio Penitentiary that killed 322 and injured 150 inmates. Some guards refused to unlock cells, so inmates overpowered guards and took their keys to rescue other prisoners. – Source
12. In 1971, a barber by the name of Merle Robbins from Reading, Ohio invented a card game called Uno. The barber invented Uno to help resolve an argument between his sons about the rules to Crazy Eight. – Source
13. A 62-foot tall statue of Jesus in Ohio was destroyed in 2010 when it was struck by lightning that caused a fire that burned it down. – Source
14. An area in Ohio called Helltown became abandoned in the 1970s when the US government drove citizens from their homes through eminent domain to form national parks. One poor soul scrawled, “This is how the Indians must have felt” on the wall of his former home. – Source
15. The BibleWalk Wax Museum in Ohio is made up of discarded wax figures and their Jesus figure was an is still unmistakably Tom Cruise. – Source
16-20 Ohio Facts
16. The largest collection of cartoon art in the world is housed at Ohio State University. The Billy Ireland Cartoon Library holds a Calvin and Hobbes collection of more than 3,000 originals. – Source
17. In 2017, Prison inmates in Ohio made a computer hidden in the ceiling, which was connected to the prison network. – Source
18. There have been multiple reports of sightings of gigantic bipedal frogs in Loveland, Ohio. – Source
19. The Cuyahoga River in Ohio was so polluted that it has caught on fire at least 13 times since 1868. Both the EPA and Clean Water Act were created as a direct response to the 1969 Cuyahoga River fire. – Source
20. In 2001, a miscalculation by a railway engineer caused Ohio locomotive #8888 to go out of control and travel unmanned on a 66-mile journey and inspire the 2010 movie, Unstoppable. – Source
21-25 Ohio Facts
21. Ohio went from 95% forest cover in the early 1800s to just 10% in 1910. Replanting efforts over the past century has led to the steady growth of forests in the state. – Source
22. The Ohio School for the Blind has a marching band that performs halftime shows for the Ohio School of the Deaf. It is the only blind marching band in the country. – Source
23. In New Straitville, Ohio, an underground fire in a coal mine started in 1884 is still burning today. 200 square miles of coal has been burnt, and in 2003 smoke emerged from the soil of Wayne National Forest because of it. – Source
24. There is a place called Pee Pee Township in Pike County, Ohio. Named after the Pee Pee Creek, which was named after a settler inscribed his initials P. P. on a tree near the bank. – Source
25. There are inmates in Ohio that are helping animals who are otherwise relatively undesirable and giving them a good chance at a new and better life. – Source
26-30 Ohio Facts
26. In 1986 Hamilton, Ohio a town of over 60,000 people, officially added an exclamation point to its name. Hamilton!. – Source
27. In 1977, a 72-second interstellar radio transmission from the constellation Sagittarius was recorded by an observatory in Ohio. It has never been recorded again, and scientists still have no idea where it originated. – Source
28. Kids’ cable network Nickelodeon originally started off as a small free “community access” station in Columbus, Ohio. – Source
29. An Ohio company including a physicist & biomimicry expert is developing a football helmet liner based on the shock-absorbing pelt of hedgehog quills. They’ve mimicked the structure of a hedgehog quill with a polymer which lets it bend but not break & mimicked the spacing & angle of each quill. – Source
30. A hot dog bun signed by Jimmy Carter is on display at a restaurant in Toledo, Ohio. – Source
