Athens street photograph

This photograph shows a street on the Ohio University campus looking north, showing the city as it existed between 1909-1914. Athens is the county seat of Athens County, Ohio. Members of the Ohio Company of Associates sent the first settlers into the area in 1797, establishing the town of Athens in 1798. According to the federal government's requirements, the Ohio Company of Associates had to establish an institution of higher education within its land grant. The company leaders chose Athens as the site for the school that eventually became known as Ohio University. Ohio University was established in 1804, with the first classes offered in 1809. Although initially more equivalent to a high school level course of instruction due to lack of a skilled faculty, by 1822 Ohio University offered a traditional college program. Athens became the county seat in 1805, and by 1880, Athens was a thriving town with six churches, three newspapers, and two banking institutions. This photograph is one of the many visual materials collected for use in the Ohio Guide. In 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt established the Works Progress Administration by executive order to create jobs for the large numbers of unemployed laborers, as well as artists, musicians, actors, and writers. The Federal Arts Program, a sector of the Works Progress Administration, included the Federal Writers’ Project, one of the primary goals of which was to complete the America Guide series, a series of guidebooks for each state which included state history, art, architecture, music, literature, and points of interest to the major cities and tours throughout the state. Work on the Ohio Guide began in 1935 with the publication of several pamphlets and brochures. The Reorganization Act of 1939 consolidated the Works Progress Administration and other agencies into the Federal Works Administration, and the Federal Writers’ Project became the Federal Writers’ Project in Ohio. The final product was published in 1940 and went through several editions. The Ohio Guide Collection consists of 4,769 photographs collected for use in Ohio Guide and other publications of the Federal Writers’ Project in Ohio from 1935-1939