Recent Stories
Jim Thorpe and Jack Creasy
In the region’s smaller industrial towns, as well as its larger cities, former high school stars (now making a living in their hometown factories and businesses) joined with recent college graduates to form the first semi-professional teams. They…
Allen Chapel & the Fifteenth Amendment
Coming soon! The story of Portsmouth's African Methodist Episcopal Church - Allen Chapel.
The Iron Man Game
Packers coach Curly Lambeau entered the game with the NFL’s best record, 10-1-1, with only two games left in the season. If the Packers defeated the Spartans they would clench their fourth league championship. The Spartans sat at 5-1-4 in the…
Portsmouth’s Basham Hill Reservoir
Portsmouth’s first water works plant was built in 1871 on the banks of the Ohio River. It was located in an area that is, today, just outside the floodwall behind Shawnee State University. That original water plant left much to be desired in terms of…
Eugene McKinley Memorial Pool & the End of Jim Crow in Portsmouth, Ohio
On Friday, June 9th, 1961, McKinley and a group of other African American school boys went swimming in a flooded sand and gravel pit that had recently been dug in the bottoms of the Scioto River. It was the last day of school and the students were…
Shawnee Lodge & the "Raven Rock" Mural
Coming Soon!
The history of Shawnee Lodge and Convention Center and the development of Shawnee State Park's Turkey Creek Lake. Highlighting the "Raven Rock" Mural, which covers a wall in the Lodge's lobby, this work of public art and history,…
Featured Stories
"Black Friday": Enforcing Ohio's "Black Laws" in Portsmouth, Ohio
In the 1830s, according to local lore, Huston Hollow, located eight miles above Portsmouth, became the location of an African-American community, which often served as the first Underground Railroad…
Picnic Point & the Promotion of Auto-tourism in Ohio's Little Smokies
In the mid-1930s the Ohio Division of Forestry, with the assistance of the Civilian Conservation Corps, built Forest Road 9, from Pond Lick Run up to this dramatic ridge-top point. They cleared this…
Lower Shawnee Town & Céloron's Expedition
Beginning in the late 1730s, the Shawnee Indians established one of their principal villages here. Some sixty years earlier, in the 1670s and 80s, the Shawnee had been expelled from the Scioto and…
Featured Tours
Frontier Conflict in the Scioto Valley
8 Locations ~ Curated by Andrew Lee Feight, Ph.D.Three-Cs in the Shawnee Forest
11 Locations ~ Curated by Andrew Feight, Ph.D.Portsmouth's Floodwall Murals
11 Locations ~ Curated by Andrew Lee Feight, Ph.D.Settling the Scioto Valley
11 Locations ~ Curated by Andrew Feight, Ph.D.Along the Scenic Scioto Heritage Trail
12 Locations ~ Curated by Andrew Lee Feight, Ph.D.Scioto Historical
A project by Andrew Feight, Ph.D.Scioto Historical is an educational mobile app and website that puts the history of southern Ohio at your fingertips. Learn about American and local history through map-based, interactive, multimedia presentations and experience professionally curated virtual historical tours on your laptop, tablet, or on a screen in your classroom. With its mobile app, Scioto Historical can guide you to historical locations and augment any walking or driving tour. Read more About Us