Decorative drawing: a small American settlement seen from a low hill. Not a photograph of this place.

Oberlin, Ohio

14 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1901 and the latest in 1986. It stands in Oberlin City. It lies in ZIP code area 44074. The Survey maps it on the Oberlin quadrangle. 8,555 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 814 feet above sea level.

Oberlin within Lorain County

Population over time

2 figures

Oberlin grew from 8,286 to 8,555 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.

Year	People	Change
2010	8,286
2020	8,555	+269 (+3%)

Then and now

1901 to 1986

The same ground, surveyed 85 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.

Topographic sheet of Oberlin, surveyed 1986

Topographic sheet of Oberlin, surveyed 1901

Compare 1901 against another survey:

Topographic sheets covering this place

14 sheets

Matched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.

Photographs

2 photographs,

Taken for the Office of War Information and the Farm Security Administration, who photographed the country between 1935 and 1944. Works of United States government photographers, with no known restriction on use. Each opens its catalogue record.

John Mercer Langston House, 207 East College Street, Oberlin, Lorain County, OH
Unattributed, . Library of Congress

First Church in Oberlin (Congregational), North Main & West Lorain Streets, Oberlin, Lorain County, OH
Unattributed, . Library of Congress

Specimens collected nearby

12 of 1,725 shown

Museums hold 1,725 specimens collected within 10 miles of Oberlin between 1852 and 1975: 847 Animalia, 615 Fungi, 227 Plantae, 15 Protozoa, 13 Chromista, 8 Unrecorded. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by A. E. Recksecker, A. E. Ricksecker, A. M. Evans and others. Each is a physical object with a catalogue number, and each entry opens the museum's record. This is what was collected and kept, not a survey of what lives here - nothing can be concluded from a species being absent.

Species	Year	Collected by	Where, as recorded
Cantharellus minor Peck	1896	F.D. Kelsey	Near Oberlin
Polyporus arcularius (Batsch) Fr.	1896	Kelsey, Francis Duncan	Kipton
Dryopteris spinulosa (O.F.Müll.) Watt	1899	Ricksecker, A.E.	Wood 4 miles south of Oberlin.
Fagus grandifolia Ehrh.	1852	Drège
Ammocrypta pellucida (Putnam, 1863)	1853	Baird, Spencer Fullerton	Black River, below falls at Elyria, Ohio
Etheostoma blennioides Rafinesque, 1819	1853	S. Baird	Black River Elgria Ohio (above falls)
Etheostoma caeruleum Storer, 1845	1853	S. Baird	Elyria, Ohio
Etheostoma maculatum Kirtland, 1840	1853	S. Baird	Elyria, Ohio
Accipiter cooperii (Bonaparte, 1828)	1894	Dawson, W. L. (William Leon)	Oberlin, Lorain, Ohio, USA
Albugo candida (Pers. ex J.F.Gmel.) Roussel	1894	F.D. Kelsey	Oberlin
Biscogniauxia atropunctata (Schwein.) Pouzar	1894	F. D. Kelsey	Oberlin.
Botrychium virginianum subsp. virginianum	1894	Dick, W.M.	Oberlin.

All 1,725 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Storms nearby

28 since 1997

The National Weather Service names Oberlin in 28 storm reports between 1997 and 2024: 17 thunderstorm wind, 7 hail, 4 flash flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
August 2023	Flash Flood	Oberlin	$200,000	Flash flooding reported in Oberlin and Pittsfield Township due to heavy rainfall. Several reports of flooded basements. OH-303 closed between Pitts Road and Quarry Road due to flash flooding. Radar estimated 2.5 to 3.5 inches of rainfall in a three hour period.
September 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$50,000	Thunderstorm winds downed trees and large limbs in Oberlin. Scattered power outages were reported as well.
May 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$35,000	A 61 mph thunderstorm wind gust was measured in Oberlin. Over a dozen trees were downed.
August 2003	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$25,000	Thunderstorm winds downed many trees in Oberlin.
July 2003	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$25,000	Thunderstorm winds downed many trees and large limbs across the county. The Oberlin, Kipton and Elyria areas were especially hard hit. A barn was blown down in Eaton Township. A car was crushed by a tree in Elyria. A peak wind gust of 54 mph was measured at the Lorain County Airport near Elyria.
June 2005	Hail	Oberlin	$20,000	Hail quarter to half dollar size was observed. A few vehicles sustained minor damage.
August 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$15,000	Thunderstorm down burst winds downed several trees and large limbs in the Oberlin area.
July 2012	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$15,000	Thunderstorm winds were estimated to be at least 70 mph. A few trees and limbs were downed.
August 2011	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$15,000	Thunderstorm winds downed several trees.
May 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$15,000	Thunderstorm winds downed several large trees and limbs.
June 1999	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$15,000	Large trees downed.
July 2012	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$5,000	Thunderstorm winds downed a tree and several large limbs along Indian Hollow Road.
April 2011	Hail	Oberlin	$5,000	Thunderstorms produced a swath of hail from Oberlin to Amhurst to Elyria. Hail ranged from penny size up to quarter size during this event.
June 2007	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$5,000	Several trees were reported down.
June 2005	Hail	Oberlin	$5,000	Nickel size hail was observed. Several other reports from the county also contained observations of penny size hail.
August 1997	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$5,000	Trees were downed.
July 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$3,000	Several large limbs were reported down.
August 2017	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$2,000	Thunderstorms winds downed several large tree limbs.
May 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$2,000	Thunderstorm winds downed a large tree west of Oberlin.
June 2008	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	$1,000	A few large limbs were reported down.
May 2024	Flash Flood	Oberlin	-	Six to eight inches of flowing water was reported across US-20 near the OH-511 interchange east of Oberlin. Radar estimated around 2 inches of rainfall in one hour at this location.
May 2011	Flash Flood	Oberlin	-	Strong thunderstorms with rain, wind, and hail moved over portions of Lorain County. Rainfall rates approaching two inches per hour were reported with this storm. Flooding occurred in Oberlin with several roads impassable with water up to the hoods on cars.
April 2006	Hail	Oberlin	-	Penny size hail was observed.
April 2006	Hail	Oberlin	-	Penny size hail was observed.
April 2002	Flash Flood	Oberlin	-	Heavy thunderstorm rains caused widespread street flooding in Oberlin. Water on some roads was over two feet in depth forcing several motorists to abandon their vehicles.
August 2000	Thunderstorm Wind	Oberlin	-	A 60 mph thunderstorm wind gust was measured.
June 1998	Hail	Oberlin	-	Large hail also fell at North Ridgeville (0.75"), Elyria (0.75") and Amherst (0.88").
August 1997	Hail	Oberlin	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Lorain County

Nearest settlements

The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.

Place	Distance	Sheets
Shiperd Circle	0.9 miles	14
Robin Park	1.1 miles	14
Nickelplate (historical)	3.8 miles	14
Pittsfield	3.9 miles	12
South Amherst	4.7 miles	12
Kipton	4.8 miles	12
Whiskyville	5.0 miles	14
Twin Lakes Homes	5.4 miles	14

Elsewhere

Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.

Wikipedia article on Oberlin	An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q988384	The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0).

Provenance

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 1049034. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.

Specimens. Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), https://www.gbif.org/. Only records licensed CC0 or CC BY are used. Records licensed CC BY-NC are excluded because this site carries advertising. Images are checked individually and any whose licence is non-commercial, no-derivatives or unreadable is refused.

Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.