Hamilton County Courthouse

The Hamilton County Courthouse, located at 1000 Main Street, and bounded by East Central Parkway, Court and Sycamore Streets, is a 6-story limestone structure with fluted columns. Completed in 1919 in an adapted Greek Ionic style, and is the fourth courthouse on this site. In the lobby on the Main Street side are memorials and markers pertaining to the terrible courthouse riot in March 1884 over a corrupt judiciary and slack sentencing, which took about 50 lives and resulted in the destruction of the building. This third courthouse building had been originally designed by Isaiah Rogers, who proposed a domed courthouse for Cincinnati in 1851; taken over by James Keys Wilson and William Walter, it was completed in the mid-1850s, without the dome. The Office of the Hamilton County Clerk of Courts originated in 1802 when the Ohio State Constitution provided for the appointment of a clerk of courts for each county. William Henry Harrison, ninth President of the United States, was appointed Hamilton County Clerk of Courts in May, 1836 and was Clerk when he was elected president in 1840. In 1851 the Clerk of Courts became an elected position for a three-year term. Since 1936 it has been a four-year term