herr2ck: Ohio History Center, pt. 1

March 2026.

As I-71 curves eastward into Linden and away from the Ohio State Fairgrounds, a stalwart concrete bastion is visible to the west. This Brutalist building is the Ohio History Center, one of Columbus’s most unique works of architecture. It is Ohio’s principal history museum and home to the Ohio History Connection. This post will be in a two-part series because I also visited the interior and returned at a later date for the library.

The Ohio History Center is located at 800 East 17th Avenue in Columbus, Ohio. It’s in a sort of gray area with the neighborhoods, but I’m grouping it with my Old North Columbus articles. It is bordered by Ohio Village to the north, the state fairgrounds to the south, I-71 to the east, and state fair parking to the west.

History

The Ohio History Connection, owners of the Ohio History Center, was founded in 1885 as the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society. It was the end result of several attempts made to establish a similar society as early as 1822, and its first president was Allen Thurman. The state began to fund the historical society in 1888, and they were soon granted purview of several historic sites in Ohio, such as Fort Ancient.

Historic photo of Sullivant Hall, previously the Ohio State Museum, prior to 1926. (Buckeye Stroll)

The Ohio History Connection had no permanent home until its first museum on Ohio State’s campus, the Ohio State Museum (now Sullivant Hall), was completed in 1914. Later, their archives were moved to the Old Governor’s Mansion in King-Lincoln Bronzeville in 1957. Three years prior, the society had changed its name to simply the Ohio Historical Society. Its present name dates from 2014, in an attempt to distance itself from the antiquated and negative connotations of a historical “society.”

The Ohio History Center under construction. (PBS)

Due to the distance between the museum on OSU campus and the archives on the east side, along with eventual overcrowding, governor Jim Rhodes proposed the construction of a new, dedicated history center in 1964. Voters approved a bond for its construction in May 1965, and the design process began that October.

Plans and a section of the Ohio History Center. (Architectural Record)

The Ohio History Center was designed by Ireland & Associates, founded by W. Byron Ireland in 1962, a former senior project designer at the firm of notable Modern architect Eero Saarinen. He had also recently come in second place for the architectural competition for Toronto City Hall. Opening in 1970, the Ohio History Center was very well received by critics following its completion, being featured as the cover piece of Architectural Record in July 1971, which also labeled it the most architecturally significant public building in Ohio since the Ohio Statehouse. The Ohio History Center also won the First Honor Award of the AIA/ALA Library Buildings Award Program in 1972. Along with these architectural accolades, the museum had an attendance of 300,000 people, ten times more than the older museum at Ohio State. It united the two formerly separate functions of archive and museum.

Aerial view of the building as originally designed. (Columbus Metropolitan Library)

The Ohio History Center is an excellent example of Brutalist architecture, with its titanic scale, orthogonal massing, and beton brut concrete walls. The brown cladding above the base consists of silo tiles (specifically “salt-glazed chute tiles”), which are tiles used to cover farm buildings. One of the building’s most prominent features is a massive 40-foot cantilever, enough to make Frank Lloyd Wright envious. This huge overhang is achieved via post-tensioned concrete, namely four concrete shafts containing stairs that run the height of the building to bedrock and horizontal beams connected to these shafts, and an intricate cable system with 193 miles of wire that essentially serve to continuously pull the edges upwards.

A view of the original appearance of the museum space. Note the since-removed lighting and staircase. (Architectural Record)

As it was built, the below-grade first floor was the primary museum space of the Ohio History Center. It originally had various “pits and platforms” to avoid the use of display cases, but this has largely been removed for better ADA compliance. The triangular plan had the museum’s three specialties centered on each corner--history, archaeology, and natural history. The remaining space was used as offices, storage, and workshops.

Students in the museum’s auditorium. This space still exists but is no longer open to the public, and I did not even know it was there. (Architectural Record)

The second floor, at grade, has a smaller glass lobby. This was originally the main entrance of the building, as cars could drive up and down the concrete ramps to the east to drop off visitors. The Ohio History Center had a rather complex method of circulation (moving around the building), as it envisioned two different paths for the various users of the space. Normal visitors entered the museum through the second floor as mentioned above, either dropped off on the ramps or walking from the eastern parking lots. However, visiting groups of students on field trips instead entered through the west directly into the museum space, where they would attend an orientation in the museum’s auditorium.

The spaces above the second floor, which are in the main exterior mass cantilevered above, are used for the Ohio History Connection’s offices and research. A library and reading room are centered in this space. They are typically not open to the public without special permission.

Removed sidewalks and lighting on the exterior. (Architectural Record)

The building has been altered over time, albeit largely to its interior layout and minor changes to the exterior. Despite Architectural Record’s pretty pictures of the brightly lit exterior at nighttime, the architectural lighting has been removed and replaced with landscaping. Additionally, several skylights slightly above grade that let sunlight into the underground museum space were also removed. The most drastic exterior change was the removal of the exterior circulation, namely sidewalks and various paths around the building, which now discourages visitors from walking beyond the main entrance. The interior has been redesigned most heavily. Many of the flamboyantly seventies features, such as the lighting and original exhibits, have been replaced with more contemporary ones. The museum is now entered from the southeast corner of the first floor, instead of above grade on the second floor.

Nearby Ohio Village, a recreated Civil War-era village north of the museum, opened in July 1974. It is a living history museum that is meant to authentically depict life in the mid-19th century. The village is presently closed for renovations but is scheduled to reopen soon, which will apparently move the time period depicted to the 1920s.

The Ohio History Center and Ohio Village were listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2023. As a result of that recent date, the PDF of the listing is not available anywhere online.

Photos

The Ohio History Center may be one of the strangest and most controversial buildings in the entirety of Columbus. To detractors, it is a featureless box on stilts that only achieves its architectural effect through its scale. This is true to some extent.

It doesn’t help that the building was designed during a time when the automobile was king, so its exterior circulation is defined by a massive road that pedestrians must cross. Aside from the lobby and office floors, the entire east elevation is dictated by two large ramps:

Still, in the spirit of Brutalism, the Ohio History Center was designed to make an impact. It is bold and unapologetic about its form, eschewing frilly ornamentation of yesteryear and nonsensically elaborate plans in favor of a pragmatic, function-focused design. Like its Modern brethren, its form follows its function.

It’s kind of ironic now considering that the stairs and ramps are too structurally deteriorated to use, and that the building has been altered so heavily that its original effects are now absent. There is no more clear hierarchy or division of space. The exterior pedestrian circulation has been removed, so this monumental building truly does stand on an island today, even though it was not designed in that manner.

I enjoyed the stark contrast here of light and shadow:

The harsh edges of Brutalist architecture tend to have that effect. NO round columns or battered corners, those are for sissies!

Let’s take a quick detour to Ohio Village, which was in the final stages of renovation when I visited:

The entrance appears to be modeled after a historic train depot. Although all of these structures are faithful reproductions of 19th-century architecture, they are exactly that--reproductions.

Peeking through the gate at the school:

The school again, what seems to be a house behind it, and possibly the courthouse:

The tower of the church can be seen way in back:

I went to Sonic Temple in the summer of 2025 (mainly to see Linkin Park) and was thoroughly confused when I saw Gothic Revival pinnacles past some trees in the parking lot. The church in Ohio Village is what they belonged to.

I took the northern ramp up to the main body of the history center, which I apparently was not supposed to do. It may be unsafe for cars, but I doubt a single dude walking would make any difference.

The silo tiles took on a nice gleam in the sunlight, and the concrete shined brightly. Despite the typical coldness of these materials, they felt a bit more pleasant in the cloudless sky.

I was loving these harshly geometric forms. This is what architects considered to be “honest” materials and structures, in that no veneer over the concrete concealed the structural system or their materiality.

These beams, which connect to the four vertical shafts inside the museum, are left exposed:

Now in front of me was the original entrance, as Ireland intended me to explore his building:

Don’t be deceived by the false claims of “ENTRY” on the leftmost door, they are locked except for larger tour groups.

Those metal brackets along the parapet are currently holding the cables that shore up the floor slab of this 40-foot cantilever such that it doesn’t come crashing down on top of me:

There may have been one oversight in this design, however--a grand axis is set up from this eastern entrance, but it leads your eye directly to compelling sights such as a parking lot and a highway:

Maybe in the 60s it was novel to watch the chromed-out Cadillacs whizzing by on the brand-new freeways, but that hasn’t been the case for about six decades now. It’s like the highway oases on Chicago’s interstates, which were once a place to leisurely enjoy dinner while watching the rat race below, but now have been turned into Postmodern hellscapes that are only a place to use the bathroom and get back to driving as quickly as possible.

I pivoted to the southeast corner of the building and took these next several photos from that angle:

From this angle, it’s pretty incredible how far outward the main block of the building extends:

Base of one of the four shafts:

One of the characteristic “waffle slabs”--these are concrete slabs with square coffers that appear similar to Eggo breakfast waffles:

Bet you’d crack a tooth on this waffle, though.

Underneath the giant cantilever:

Interesting diagonal shadows on the beams:

Beyond the elevation gain north of downtown, I was also on a big pedestal above the normal grade of the area, so the skyscrapers rise above the state fair buildings:

This was at the point where I went inside during my original visit. Don’t worry, though, I came back out and continued where I left off.

I think this photo is in the vicinity of the entrance, but it’s definitely right below the ramps:

This concrete bridge is the original pedestrian access to the entrance, and it seems to be clad in a death shroud as of late:

An oblique view of the building from the south:

I set my camera on the concrete wall that forms the border of the pedestal next--the focus is a bit wonky, but it does a fair job showing the cliff between both grade levels:

South elevation:

The sole remaining skylight on this level (remember that there used to be several) belongs to the auditorium, where schoolchildren originally entered for field trips: