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History of Ohio

Ohio, situated in the Midwestern United States, is an integral part of the Great Lakes region. It was first inhabited by a number of Native American tribes, including the Shawnee, Miamis, Wyandots, and the Iroquois. In the mid-1600s, after the Beaver Wars, a considerable portion of Ohio was claimed as a hunting ground by the Iroquois Confederation of the New York area. During the mid-to-late 17th century, the area was also inhabited by the Algonquian-speaking descendants of the Hopewell, Mississippian, and Adena cultures. Major historical events that took place in Ohio prior to the arrival of the Europeans were the Yellow Creek Massacre and the Gnadenhutten.

A system of fur-trading posts was established in the area by the French during the 18th century. The French and Indian War, fought between Great Britain and France in 1754, ended with the Treaty of Paris, as a result of which the control of Ohio and the rest of the Old North-west was ceded to Great Britain. The British military control was challenged by the Pontiac’s Rebellion of the 1760s, and finally came to an end with the American victory in the American Revolutionary War. The Northwest Territory was formed by the United States under the Northwest Ordinance of 1787.

The constitution and the boundaries of Ohio were approved by an act of Congress, signed by President Jefferson, on February 19, 1803. However, no resolution officially admitting Ohio as the 17th state was ever passed by the Congress. It was on August 7, 1953, the year of Ohio’s 50th Anniversary, that the act formally declaring March 1, 1803 the date of Ohio’s admittance to the Union was signed by President Eisenhower.