Lorain County, Ohio

History

Lorain County was established in 1822, from portions of several of its adjacent counties. This county became judicially-independent in 1824. The original proposed name for the county was "Colerain". ( and therefore, the final name "Lorain" seems to have no true intended connection to the Alsace-Lorraine area of France, as theorized by later historians).

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 923 square miles (2,390 km²), of which 491 square miles (1,270 km²) is land and 432 square miles (1,120 km²) (47%) is water. It is the fourth-largest county in Ohio by total area.

Adjacent counties

Demographics

As of the 2010 United States Census, there were 301,356 people, 116,274 households, and 80,077 families residing in the county. The population density was 613.6 inhabitants per square mile (236.9/km²). There were 127,036 housing units at an average density of 258.7 per square mile (99.9/km²). The racial makeup of the county was 84.8% white, 8.6% black or African American, 0.9% Asian, 0.3% American Indian, 2.5% from other races, and 3.0% from two or more races. Those of Hispanic or Latino origin made up 8.4% of the population. In terms of ancestry, 26.5% were German, 16.7% were Irish, 10.9% were English, 8.4% were Polish, 8.2% were Italian, 6.2% were American, and 5.2% were Hungarian.

Of the 116,274 households, 32.6% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 50.5% were married couples living together, 13.5% had a female householder with no husband present, 31.1% were non-families, and 26.0% of all households were made up of individuals. The average household size was 2.51 and the average family size was 3.02. The median age was 40.0 years.

The median income for a household in the county was $52,066 and the median income for a family was $62,082. Males had a median income of $49,146 versus $35,334 for females. The per capita income for the county was $25,002. About 10.3% of families and 13.1% of the population were below the poverty line, including 20.5% of those under age 18 and 8.0% of those age 65 or over.

Politics

Lorain County is predominantly Democratic having voted for the Democratic candidate for president in 12 of the last 15 elections. In 2016 Donald Trump came within 131 votes of being the first Republican to capture the county since Ronald Reagan in 1984.

Higher education

Public school districts

There are 20 public school districts in Lorain County. Those primarily in Lorain County are listed in bold. Each district's high school(s) and location is also listed.

The county also includes the Lorain County Joint Vocational School District, which encompasses the entire county and serves students from the Amherst, Avon, Avon Lake, Clearview, Columbia, Elyria, Firelands, Keystone, Midview, North Ridgeville, Oberlin, Sheffield-Sheffield Lake and Wellington school districts from a 10-acre campus on a 100-acre site near the intersection of State Route 58 and U.S. Route 20 in Oberlin.

Private high schools

Census-designated places