Western Reserve Historical Society (Cleveland)
Museums, Historical Sites, and ZoosOhio, United States51-200 Employees
The Western Reserve Historical Society, based in Cleveland, is a regional history institution focused on preserving the early history of Cleveland and the Western Reserve. Its Library/Archives contain millions of items—books, photographs, manuscripts, and documents—and serve as a major research resource for scholars, genealogists, and the general public. The collections span Civil War material and extensive ethnic and community histories, including African-American, Irish, Italian, and Jewish strands, along with business, industrial, entrepreneurial, and political records. The museum component includes two early 20th-century homes and one of the largest historic costume and textile collections in the country; it also holds the nation's largest Shaker collection, thousands of decorative arts artifacts, about 800 paintings, and the Crawford Auto/Aviation Collection with more than 140 cars and ten airplanes. The society was founded in 1867 and remains a mid-sized cultural organization; in recent years it has been highlighted as part of regional collaborations with universities and other museums, reflecting its role in Cleveland's cultural network.