Area History

How appropriate that Richland Academy of the Arts would find a home within a grand old landmark theater of downtown Mansfield. It has not looked like a theater in quite a while. Built in 1916, the Majestic Theater was showing movies long before the art form had developed the capability for sound, so it had […]

The moral of the story always has it that idle gossip always leads to no good. I’m here to prove exactly the opposite this time: idle gossip in Mansfield led to a highly important literary award; a significant step on the ladder to fame; and a very lucrative film contract. Not to mention a movie […]

Editor’s Note: This is an ongoing series which runs each Thursday morning titled the Richland Chronicles Volume 5, by author Paul Lintern. It is set in the 1860s and tells the story of Richland County through the eyes of young people. This is the fifth in a series. Volume I was Amelia Changes Her Tune. Volume II was Isaac and Wolf Paw Find […]

Just northeast of Butler there is a sharp bend in the traffic where Teeter Road, Snyder Road, and State Route 97 all converge; and for many generations the place has been known as Four Corners. In spite of whatever denominational sign is out front of the little church, in whatever generation it happens to be […]

When I was a kid I heard about how the earth rotated every 24 hours, and they said it actually moved quite quickly, even though we are apparently hypnotized into not feeling it. I had this very clear concept that if you could get up above the town, higher than the tops of the trees […]

Driving into Lexington from the north on Rt 42 there is a smooth curve in the road where Rt 97 and Orchard Park Road come in from the south and the east, but that was not always the case. In the 1920s, at the place where 42 and Orchard Park meet, there was a fairly […]

There is an old joke in Mansfield I need to pass along to a new generation before it floats down the river of time and out of sight forever. Like many old jokes that originated in former eras of our nation’s culture, it requires a little background in order to fully appreciate the humor. To […]

Editor’s Note: This is an ongoing series which runs each Thursday morning titled the Richland Chronicles Volume 5, by author Paul Lintern. It is set in the 1860s and tells the story of Richland County through the eyes of young people. This is the fifth in a series. Volume I was Amelia Changes Her Tune. Volume II was Isaac and Wolf Paw Find […]

Two prominent features of the early 20th century Fourth Street skyline are clearly depicted in this image from the 1940s; landmarks you won’t see there today: The First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in the foreground left this view in 1956 when they moved to the corner of Third & Bowman; The Mansfield News building, […]