public high learning institution in northwestern Ohio began in the late 1800s as part of the growth in public institutions during the Progressive Era to meet demands for training and professional development of teachers. During the period, people of northwestern Ohio campaigned for a school in their region to produce better quality education and educators. The movement argued that the existing universities, Ohio State University in Columbus, Miami University in Oxford and Ohio University in Athens, were distant and the region lacked a state-supported school of its own.
==== Lowry Bill ====
In 1910, the Ohio General Assembly passed the Lowry Normal School Bill that authorized Governor Judson Harmon to appoint the Commission on Normal School Sites to survey forty communities for two sites for normal schools, one in northeastern Ohio and one in northwestern Ohio. The commission examined population within a 25-mile (40.2 km) radius of each community, along with railroad and transportation infrastructure, the moral …
