Welcome
Book Reviews
Edmunds begins by noting the rich and lengthy history of Ohio's native period, from the pre-Columbian to the eighteenth century. Moving first through the pre-Columbian peoples, Adena and Hopewell, Edmunds places them in a global context by comparing them to early cultures who built complex and powerful city-states along the Tigris and Euphrates, the Nile and the Tiber. All had some elements in common (e.g. priest king rulers, monuments). The point is that Ohio history did not begin with the first Europeans, but is situated within a larger global development of complex societies that predates Spanish, French and British exploration and conquest. Yet, as Edmunds notes, the native cultures did not remain dominant, so Ohioans speak English, not Shawnee or Sioux. Although native peoples lost control of Ohio, they were not merely pawns of the Europeans, they (and Ohio) were a critical part of the struggle for empire in North America. The successful war for independence by the newly formed United States did not mean peace in Ohio; the bloody struggle continued until roughly 1815 when Tecumseh's last efforts to keep Ohio for Indians failed.
Moving forward with the theme of race in Ohio but losing the global focus, James Horton's piece “Race and Region: Ohio, America's Middle Ground” carries the narrative into the nineteenth century. Horton discusses the movement of blacks into Ohio, despite the passage of Black Laws in 1803 and 1807 that sought to discourage such behavior, and the growth of anti-slavery and abolitionism. Horton characterizes Ohio through 1850 as a geographic, economic, political, and racial middle ground between the slave South and the free North. Within the state, differences emerged between the more racially tense, southern focused Cincinnati and the somewhat more tolerant Cleveland and northeast section of the state. Horton's essay uses most of the space to discuss anti-slavery and abolition efforts developing in Ohio through 1850, noting the creation of Lane Seminary in Cincinnati, integrated and strong anti-slavery Oberlin College, and the activities of various Underground Railroad conductors such as John Rankin and John Parker. In the end, Horton provides an interesting overview of Ohio's divided nature and importance in anti-slavery and abolition, but he fails to place these developments in a global context. For example, it might have been useful to examine Ohio as part of an Atlantic World effort to abolish slavery.
The lack of global focus continues in Eric Foner's “Ohio and the World: The Civil War Era.” While there is ample discussion of Ohio's importance in the Civil War, Foner's only global connection is his brief mention of immigration to Ohio from Ireland and Germany. Otherwise, Foner reiterates the many Ohioans who played key roles, including Salmon P. Chase, Benjamin F. Wade, John Sherman, Clement Vallandigham, John Bingham and Rutherford B. Hayes, Edwin Stanton, Jay Cooke and generals such as Ulysses S. Grant, William T. Sherman and Philip H. Sheridan. Of course, Ohio's importance to the war meant its continued centrality to party politics afterwards. Hayes, James A. Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, and William McKinley all fought in the war and Ohio dominated presidential politics at least through 1900. The war led Chase, Hayes and other Republicans to craft “a comprehensive world view glorifying the North as the home of progress, opportunity, and freedom” (78). Republicans also played key roles in passage of the 1866 Civil Rights Act and Congressman John Bingham was the major author of the 14th Amendment. There were some small changes in race relations in Ohio as a result of the war. Some 5,000 blacks served in the Union army, Cleveland and Cincinnati desegregated street cars during the war, and passage of the 15th Amendment meant that blacks in Ohio could vote for first time in 1870. Sadly, blacks were still barred from public facilities and skilled employment, but won legal battles against discrimination in railroads, hospitals, asylums, and in some communities, schools. Women also experienced new roles during the war, and this helped lead to calls for suffrage.
