Akron metropolitan area

Akron () is a city in and the county seat of Summit County, Ohio, United States. At the 2020 census, the city proper had a total population of 190,469, making it the fifth-most populous city in Ohio and 136th-most populous city in the United States. The Akron metropolitan area, covering Summit and Portage counties, had a population of 702,219. It is located on the western edge of the Glaciated Allegheny Plateau in Northeast Ohio about 40 miles (64 km) south of downtown Cleveland. The city was founded by Simon Perkins and Paul Williams in 1825 along the Little Cuyahoga River at the summit of the developing Ohio and Erie Canal. The name is derived from the Ancient Greek word ἄκρον : ákron signifying a summit or high point. It was briefly renamed South Akron after Eliakim Crosby founded nearby North Akron in 1833, until both merged into an incorporated village in 1836. In the 1910s, Akron doubled in population, making it the nation's fastest-growing city. A long history of rubber and tire manufacturing, carried on today by the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, gave Akron the nickname "Rubber Capital of the World". It was once known as a center of airship development. Today, its economy includes manufacturing, education, healthcare, and biomedical research; leading corporations include Gojo Industries, FirstEnergy, Huntington Bank, and Charter Spectrum. Notable historic events in Akron include the passage of the Akron School Law of 1847, which created the K–12 system; the popularization of the church architectural Akron Plan, the foundation of Alcoholics Anonymous, the Akron Experiment into preventing goiters with iodized salt, the 1983 Supreme Court case City of Akron v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health; and portions of the 2014 Gay Games. A racially diverse city, it has seen noted racial relations speeches by Sojourner Truth in 1851 (the Ain't I A Woman? speech), W. E. B. Du Bois in 1920, and President Bill Clinton in 1997. In 1914, Marcus Garvey founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association in Akron. Episodes of major civil unrest in Akron have included the riot of 1900, rubber strike of 1936, the Wooster Avenue riots of 1968, and the 2022 protests surrounding the killing of Jayland Walker.

Skeeles Field, formerly known as Lee R. Jackson Baseball Field, is a baseball venue on the campus of the University of Akron in Akron, Ohio, United States. It is the home field of the Akron Zips baseball team and part of the 23-acre (9.3 ha) Lee R. Jackson Athletic Complex which also includes the varsity softball field, track and field complex, a football practice field, and FirstEnergy Stadium–Cub Cadet Field. The facility was built in 1967, moved to its current site in 1972, and has a listed seating capacity of 1,500 spectators. The venue is named for Bill and Mary Skeeles, with Bill being a 1977 Akron alumnus and former Zips baseball player. The Skeeles donated $1 million in 2019 towards a $2 million, two-phase project to upgrade the facility as part of the return of the Zips baseball program in 2020 after the program was eliminated in 2015. The complex is named for Lee R. Jackson, former chairman of the university's board of directors. The baseball field was also named for Jackson until 2020.

FirstEnergy Stadium–Cub Cadet Field, formerly known as Lee R. Jackson Soccer Field, is a soccer-specific stadium on the campus of the University of Akron in Akron, Ohio, United States. It is the home field of the Akron Zips men's and women's soccer teams. The facility is part of the Lee Jackson Field Complex, a 23-acre (9.3 ha) multi-purpose facility which serves the University of Akron's various intercollegiate programs. Originally dedicated on October 22, 1936, as Lee R. Jackson Field, after the former chairman of the University of Akron Board of Directors and retired president of the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company. Jackson was captain of the 1910 football Akron football team and a three-year letterman.

The University of Akron is a public research university in Akron, Ohio. It is part of the University System of Ohio. As a STEM-focused institution, it focuses on industries such as polymers, advanced materials, and engineering. It is classified among "R2: Doctoral Universities – High research activity".The University of Akron offers about 200 undergraduate and more than 100 graduate majors and has an enrollment of approximately 15,000 students. The university's School of Polymer Science and Polymer Engineering is housed in a 12-story reflective glass building near downtown Akron on the western edge of the main campus. UA's Archives of the History of American Psychology is an affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution. The university has three branch campuses: Wayne College in Orrville, Ohio; the Medina County University Center, in Lafayette Township, Ohio; and UA Lakewood, in the Cleveland suburb of Lakewood, Ohio. In addition, the university hosts nursing programs in affiliation with Lorain County Community College.

InfoCision Stadium–Summa Field is a college American football stadium in Akron, Ohio and the home field of the Akron Zips football team at the University of Akron. New for the 2009 football season, the official ground-breaking ceremony for the stadium was held on April 4, 2008, and it opened on September 12, 2009, for a sold-out game between the Akron Zips and the Morgan State Bears. The stadium was constructed to replace the Rubber Bowl, which was the prior home of the University of Akron Zips football team. Four companies hold naming rights to various parts of the stadium.

University of Akron School of Law is the law school at the University of Akron in Akron, Ohio. Offering both Juris Doctor and Master of Laws degrees, it was founded in 1921 as the Akron School of Law and merged with the University of Akron in 1959, becoming fully accredited by the American Bar Association in 1961. Since 1921, the school has produced over 6,000 graduates who have gone on to careers in the private and public sectors, including several notable judges and politicians. Located across from E. J. Thomas Hall on University Avenue, the University of Akron School of Law is housed in the C. Blake McDowell Law Center on the northwest portion of the University of Akron campus. It also houses the Joseph G. Miller and William C. Becker Institute for Professional Responsibility and The University of Akron Center for Constitutional Law, one of only four constitutional law centers established by Congress in the United States.

Akron Union Station was a series of three union stations serving several passenger railroads in Akron, Ohio from 1852 to 1971. The station's tenants included the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, Pennsylvania Railroad and Erie Railroad. It was a hub, serving train companies serving destinations in different directions, west, north, south and east.

The University of Akron College of Business is a dual accredited AACSB business school of the University of Akron in Akron, Ohio. The college has a total enrollment of nearly 1,700 undergraduate students and 217 graduate students. All of the college's programs are accredited by AACSB International – the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business. The college currently uses two buildings, the first which was opened in 1991, is a four-story, 81,000-square-foot (7,500 m2) structure with 19 classrooms. In 2020, it was expanded with an newly built professional development building, increasing both the number of classrooms and office facilities. In addition, the college's marketing department is housed in the Polsky building, where it occupies the fifth floor. There are several institutes and research centers in the college, including the Fisher Institute for Professional Selling, the Fitzgerald Institute for Entrepreneurial Studies, the Institute for Global Business, the Taylor Institute for Direct Marketing, the Center for Information Technology and e-Business, the Center for Organizational Development, the Center for Research and Training in Information Security and Assurance and the Suarez Applied Marketing Research Laboratories.

Memorial Hall was an on-campus athletics building on the campus of the University of Akron in Akron, Ohio. The 33,000-square-foot (3,100 m2) building was the first to be built during the tenure of Norman P. Auburn, Akron's 10th president, and the first to be built beyond the original Butchel College lands. Memorial Hall was open for the start of the 1954–55 school year, and was dedicated on December 11, 1954, in honor of the 1,534 Summit County residents who lost their lives in World War II. The building replaced Crouse Gymnasium, built in 1888 and the oldest building on campus at the time, as the home for physical education. It also served as the new home of the men's basketball team, allowing them to host home games on campus again. The team had moved out of Crouse Gymnasium, which had seating for only a few hundred fans, in the 1920s to the larger off-campus Akron Armory.The arena itself, like many built at the time, featured sideline chair seating above lower retractable bleachers. The ground level of Memorial Hall, below the arena, included a pool. During its time it served as the home of the Akron Zips men's basketball team from its opening, and the women's basketball team from its founding in 1974, until the opening of the James A. Rhodes Arena in 1983, which was built just east of the hall and connected by a sky bridge. The hall was also the school's major gathering place prior to the opening of Rhodes Arena, hosting, among others, President Lyndon B. Johnson and candidate Barry Goldwater in 1964, then-candidate Richard M. Nixon in 1968, Ralph Nader, Dick Gregory and Pat Paulsen, as well as musical acts including Chicago, Ray Charles, The Fifth Dimension and Stevie Wonder.After the opening of Rhodes Arena, the building served as a classroom and intramural space until its closing in 2010. It was originally demolished to make way for a new College of Education, but that school eventually stayed in a renovated Zook Hall. As of 2022, the area is open green space.

St. Bernard's Church ( BURN-ərdz) is a historic stone masonry church at 44 University Avenue in Akron, Ohio.

The Akron Civic Theatre (originally the Loew's Theatre) is a theater in Akron, Ohio. It is one of only five remaining atmospheric theatres designed by John Eberson in the United States and is an excellent example of the great movie palaces of the 1920s. The Akron Civic Theatre is the last remaining theater of 11 opened by Marcus Loew, founder of the Loew's theater chain. The Civic is located on South Main Street in Akron and can seat 3,000 people. The theater has been exhibiting shows and special events for 95 years.

E. J. Thomas Performing Arts Hall, more commonly known as E. J. Thomas Hall, is a performing arts hall located in downtown Akron, Ohio on the University of Akron campus.