Built in 1913 in the Neoclassical architecture. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in
1975. A historic map-sheet match is not published yet. The record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary.
From the record
“The Ohio State Normal College at Kent is a historic district in Kent, Ohio, United States. It consists of the five original buildings on the main campus of Kent State University, with the first, Merrill Hall, opening in 1913 and the last, Moulton Hall, opening in 1917.”
Wikipedia article Ohio State Normal College at Kent, CC BY-SA 4.0.
one of 42 National Register listings in Portage County · listed in 1975 · category: Building · built in 1913, Neoclassical architecture.
National Register reference number.75001526- the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.
The ground it stands on
3,758 words
The chapter on Kent City in A Visitation of the County of Kent, published 1906 names Kent. This is what it says, exactly as the scans read.
Stowe MS. 621 in the British Museum, formerly the property of John Holland, is described in the catalogue : « Original Pedigrees of Kentish Families to 1663 (in which year Bysshe made a Visitation of the County), with the signatures of members of the several families, f. 2," and on the title page is written " A peice of the Visitation of Kent." This manuscript contains sixteen pedigrees in the same handwriting as the Heralds' College copy, and all signed by the heads of the families or their representatives, whereas the pedigrees of the same families lare not signed in the College copy, so it would seem that some of the original pages had been mislaid and a copy substituted for them in the official copy in the College. These pedigrees are marked (Stowe MS. 621) in the reference.
These complaints were delivered to Sir Edward Bysshe by his own request by Sir Edward Walker, Garter King of Arms.* He appaiently disregarded them, for at fo. 100 we find that an order was made by James, Earl of Suffolk, deputy to the Earl Marshal, prohibiting Sir Edward Bysshe to make airy new Visitations until he had rectified the errors and defects of the books of his Visitation of Kent (among others). There is in Add. MS. 22,883 a summary of the alleged errors in this Visitation, as follows : - have been done." It is curious to note that these complaints were mostly made between 1670 and 1674, whereas the Visitation is said to have been finished in 1668, but there is no further reference to them in the correspondence. Sir Edward Bysshe died in 1679.f
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. Museums hold 772 specimens
collected within 10 miles of Ohio State Normal College At Kent between 1883 and
1975: 498 Animalia, 234 Plantae, 33 Fungi, 5 Unrecorded, 1 Protozoa, 1 Bacteria. 12 distinct Species records are shown.
Collected by A. D. Huryn, A. F. Clewell, A. K. Wyatt 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.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists
13 workings within 5 miles of Ohio State Normal College At Kent: 6 past producers, 5 producers, 2 plants.
7 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction. Distance is straight-line from the
map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring
settlement's page as well.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The National Weather Service names
Kent, the town this property stands in, in 34 storm reports between 1994 and 2025: 25 thunderstorm wind, 8 hail, 1 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.
A thunderstorm downburst with winds estimated at 85 to 95 mph hit the west side of Kent. The area affected by the downburst was one quarter wide mile and approximately a mile in length. Several hundred trees and 40 power poles were downed. A total of 25 homes were damaged including four that were declared unhabitable. In addition, a camper and over a dozen automobiles were crushed by fallen trees. Widespread power outages occurred and a state of emergency was put in effect because of the widespread and severe damage.
Widespread flash flooding in Kent and Ravenna. Several roads flooded and impassable with several feet of standing water, including OH-59 between downtown Ravenna and OH-44. Dispatch received 30 calls to assist motorists stranded in flood waters. Widespread basement flooding reported. Radar estimates and gauge measurements indicate 3 to 3.25 inches of rainfall in a two hour period.
Thunderstorm winds downed between 15 and 20 trees in Kent and surrounding Franklin Township. Two houses in Kent were damaged by fallen trees. Both houses sustained roof damage with one also having a wall knocked down.
Members of the public and social media indicated tree damage in Kent. Two trees were downed on Riverbend Trail and three trees were downed in Artemis Drive Park.
Trained spotter's personal weather station recorded a peak convective gust of 80 mph about 1.5-miles southwest of Kent. Numerous large trees were snapped in the area.
No historic map-sheet match is published
for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs
a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary.
Browse the county's mapped places while that work is
pending.
From the nomination file
3,289 words on record
When this property was proposed for the
National Register, someone wrote the case for it: what the building is,
and why it matters. That document is a federal record in the public domain.
It is quoted below word for word, never summarised. The text was read off the scanned case file by machine, so the
occasional stray character is the recogniser's and the 1970s
typewriter's.
Description of the property
idiom. They are referred to, from southwest to northeast, as Kent, Administration, Merrill, Lowry and Moulton. The oldest parts of Ly open window pattern, very much like factory construction. Then to its side elevations, i. e., a series of square three-story brick Greek temple facade, consisting of eight pilasters, an entablature This addition provided additional office space, lounges, and an enlarg- three. Lowry is down the hill from Merrill, and Moulton is below six-column wooden portico, the columns at the corners being doubled. CONDITION the most impressive frontispiece, consisting of six two-story stone pedestrian corridors which were part of the original plan.The two The hall's end wings have recessed porches on the two upper floors.
Kent, Administration and Merrill are connected by diagonal On Kent and Merrill Halls, this construction permits an unusual- the buildings are constructed of yellow brick masonry with gray flight of steps.This difference is one of the nice adjustments to away to the northwest. The siting and the relationships between the the differences in grade level. drives. Some alterations have been made to increase the usable ed stage area within the facade for the second floor auditorium. The original facade of the Administration building was identical space and to make the rear entrances more functional. The large gymnasium addition was attached to the rear of the piers.Slightly projecting end wings give ita slender E-shaped plan stone trim over a reinforced concrete structure.
unfluted Ionic columns on an arcaded brick ground story.Merrill's main entrance is a very elaborate entablature on console brackets. which form a coherent environmental and architectural entity.They are arranged in.a gentle curve on the brow of a hill which slopes and pediment, all resting on a ground-story podium.The inter-column spaces are blind.
a Roman dome which was never realized. A topographical survey was (1855-1938) was a Cleveland architect who studied at the Massachusetts ival style: In addition, Kent was the first state normal college in of the city. a teacher training school in northeastern Ohio and.made a $l50,000 duce the concept of extension work in Ohio.With the first full acad- Engineering The five oldest buildings of Kent State University constitute a acres in the city of Kent for the campus. Kent was the son of Marvin Institute of Technology, opened his own office in Boston in 1884, and Massachusetts in 1839,teacher training was left largely to the private for the Kent buildings was Robert H.Evans & Company of Columbus.
moved to Cleveland around 190o.Other works of his in Ohio included Political Other (Specify) PERIOD (Check One or More as Appropriate) AREAS OF SIGNIFICANCE (Check One or More as Appropriate) appropriation for the first two buildings.William S. Kent donated 53 significant and distinguishable group.This is due largely to their in Ohio in the 1870s and 1880s. In 1910 the Ohio Legislature authorized with preparing a master campus plan in 19ll.The plan envisioneda
Quoted from the National Register nomination
for reference 75001526, 20 pages, held by the National Archives in Record
Group 79. See the
catalogue record.
Listed places nearby
6 within 8 miles
Other National Register properties close
enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both
positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties
to their map sheets.
Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
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.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
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.
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