Athens County Public Libraries

The Athens Skate Park is, as the name states, a skatepark located in Athens, Ohio, behind the Athens Recreational Center (known simply as "The Rec Center" to locals.) The park was at one time the only skatepark in the world to feature a capsule (a full pipe connected to a cradle). The park was built by Grindline Skateparks in 2003 and is the second-largest concrete skatepark in Ohio behind the Kettering street Plaza. The park features both cement and concrete coping. It has ramps of all sizes and many unique spots. The park is a work in progress. After a set of years, they stopped adding on to the skatepark, leaving how it is to this day. During the summer of 2005 a stage was built and with the insertion of electricity in January 2006 bands can play the stage and events can proceed with ease. The skatepark is located 40 minutes from the Skatopia in Rutland, Ohio.

WOUB (1340 AM) is a public radio station in Athens, Ohio. Unlike its FM counterpart, WOUB-FM, WOUB AM is generally more of a community radio station, with mainly programming for residents of Athens County, plus alternative music programming, and news from the BBC, among other programs. Owned and operated by Ohio University, WOUB is on the air daily from 6 a.m. to midnight.

The Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine (OU-HCOM) is the medical school of Ohio University and the only osteopathic medical school in the U.S. state of Ohio. Its mission is to emphasize the practice of primary care and train physicians to serve Ohio, especially in the underserved Appalachian and urban areas of the state. Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine offers a single program conferring the degree Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine (D.O.), and several combined degree programs. Graduates are eligible to practice medicine in all 50 states and more than 50 countries. The college is fully accredited by the American Osteopathic Association's Commission on Osteopathic College Accreditation, and by the Institutions of Higher Education of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools. The World Directory of Medical Schools lists the school as a US medical school along with other accredited US MD and DO programs.

Palmer Fest is an annual block party in Athens, Ohio, usually taking place annually in May on Palmer Street near the city's eastern edge. Palmer Street is a major student neighborhood of Ohio University. The event regularly attracts regional attention and sparks controversy as tens of thousands of students from universities around the state gather on the street, and reportedly engage in binge drinking and other disruptive behavior. The origins of Palmer Fest can be traced to 1988, where the residents of 5, 6, 7 and 8 Palmer Street bought kegs and had a massive block party, culminating with a performance of an America cover band in the backyard of 7 Palmer Street. The tradition was continued and was named Palmer Fest in 1991. It was started by Lorain natives Cris Loy, Layne Songer and Mike Cioffi. The street fest's original iteration included 500 friends and neighbors of the street residents. During the first Palmer Fest, residents pooled their money together to rent a beer trailer. In 1992, individual residents hosted their own house parties with a concentration of people gathering in the backyards of 19, 21, 23 and 25 Palmer Street. After 25 years of annual parties, the attendance of the fest has grown to around 8,000 people. Substantial police presence is required each year, and the event attracted attention throughout the state as the 2009 and 2010 iterations of the party had to be shut down by riot police after "near riots" erupted with intoxicated attendees setting fires to furniture in the streets and throwing debris at police officers and fire department crews attempting to control the crowds. Subsequent backlash saw the city crack down on party ordinances, though Palmer Fest has spawned spinoff parties in town and around the state.

Hawk Woods is an old-growth forest located in central Athens County, Ohio, United States, outside the city of Athens. The forest comprises 106 acres (0.43 km2) of foothills in the Allegheny Plateau region. Adjacent to Strouds Run State Park, the woods now are included in a state nature preserve named the Dale & Jackie Riddle State Nature Preserve.

Athens is a city and the county seat of Athens County, Ohio, United States. The population was 23,849 at the 2020 census. Located along the Hocking River within Appalachian Ohio about 65 miles (105 km) southeast of Columbus, Athens is best known as the home of Ohio University, a large public research university with an undergraduate and graduate enrollment of more than 21,000 students. It is the principal city of the Athens micropolitan area.

Sells Park, popularly known as Athens Pond, is a public park near Ohio University in Athens, Ohio. Claimed to be "one of Athens’s best hidden treasures", it comprises 22.5 acres (91,000 m2), and includes Sells Pond (Athens Pond) which is composed of an area of 1,876 square yards (1,569 m2).

The College Lands were a tract of land in the Northwest Territory, later Ohio, that the Congress donated for the support of a university. Ohio University became the first college northwest of the Ohio River as a beneficiary of this tract.

Ohio Brew Week is a festival held annually in Athens, Ohio. The 9-day celebration of Ohio brewing brings together brewers and beer lovers from all around the nation to sample beers and celebrate the joy of craft brewing. It is a week full of the celebration of “craft beer and Ohio pride.” More than 26 different breweries located around Ohio showcase their beer at restaurants, bars, and breweries in uptown Athens. These breweries include: Great Lakes Brewing Co. in Cleveland, Rhinegeist Brewing Co. in Cincinnati, and a local favorite, Jackie O's Brewery in Athens. Events, concerts, and competitions are held throughout the week as well as barbecue cookouts, multiple happy hours, dinners, "meet the brewer", pool tournaments, tastings, golf outings, karaoke, corn hole tournaments, trivia, a haunted tour, and other activities.

The Athens News (stylized as NEWS) is an American free weekly, English-language newspaper published in Athens, Ohio. It was founded in 1977, and serves the area that contains Ohio University. It was initial published weekly under the name Athena "A" News but was published every Monday and Thursday since 1982 before becoming a weekly paper in 2019. Today, it publishes every Wednesday. It is one of three newspapers in Athens County, alongside The Athens Messenger and Ohio University's The Post. In the fall of 2014, the News was acquired by Adams Publishing Group, who had acquired the Messenger earlier that year. Corinne Colbert currently serves as editor of the publication and Cole Behrens serves as Associate Editor. The Athens NEWS was founded in 1977 as an alternative publication to the local media environment, which included The Athens Messenger and The OU Post — but in the 1980s The Athens NEWS became a staple for local news in Athens due to its focus on the city and investigative content. The Athens NEWS recently celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2017 and commemorated the occasion by publishing a book "40 Years on the Bricks: A History of The Athens NEWS." Microfilmed issues of the Athens News issues from 1977 to 1990 and paper issues from 2000 to present are located at the Ohio University Alden Library Annex.

Halloween in Athens Ohio is an annual block party in Uptown Athens, Ohio, United States. Although called a block party, the festivities span several blocks and revelers can be found at house parties around the city. On the closest Saturday to Halloween, an estimated 10,000 to 30,000 party-goers dressed in costumes descend upon the City of Athens. The Ohio University spends roughly $90,000 a year in security and safety measures for the campus. The City of Athens brings in Police forces from surrounding counties to help with crowd control and safety.

Athens Downtown Historic District is a registered historic district in Athens, Ohio, United States, listed in the National Register on September 30, 1982. It contains 88 contributing buildings, made from an assortment of materials. The architecture is in the style of Late Victorian with periods of significance from 1900–1924, 1875–1899, and 1850–1874. The downtown district is currently being used for Commerce / Trade, Domestic, Education, and Government.The district has a number of contiguous contributing buildings, many with brick facades, bracketed cornices, and decorative arched stone lintels.