67Titles
Explore publications and collections from the past.
Community History Archive Partner
Union Township Public Library
Ripley, Ohio
Explore this community history collection to discover the people, places, organizations, and events of Ripley.
1822 to 2025Dates represented
See individual titles for available dates.
619,168Archive pages
Historical pages reported for this collection.
Explore local history
Discover the people, places, and stories of Ripley, Ohio.
Discover another side of Ripley, Ohio through newspapers and religious organization documents preserved in the Union Township Public Library's digital archive. Its sixty-seven titles include material from 1822 to 2025.
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Selected titles
Selected titles from Union Township Public Library include “Adams County News” and “West Union Intelligencer”.
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Free and open access
No subscription or payment required.
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A closer look
An earlier generation comes into view through the stories its newspapers chose to report, placing familiar names and events within the concerns of their time.
The reporting of earlier years offers a way to explore how events were understood as they happened and how local experiences became part of the historical record. A family story, a classroom project or curiosity about a familiar place can lead to a closer look at the community and the lives of earlier generations. Explore the archive online for free, without a subscription.
Explore the collection
Titles in this collection
Browse sixty-seven titles and 619,168 digitized pages, with material from 1822 to 2025. Through a partnership with Advantage Archives, Union Township Public Library shares these sources from the past. Some years or items may be missing between the dates shown.
Follow a family connection or a question about the community through the titles below and the history they preserve.
Adams County News
694 pages from 1890 to 1892
Adams County Record
3,484 pages from 1903 to 1920
Brown County Democrat
492 pages from 1855 to 1859
Brown County News
3,392 pages from 1864 to 1886
Brown County News
8 pages in 1867
Brown County Press
3,152 pages from 2013 to 2014
Brown County Press
9,128 pages from 2012 to 2018
Browns County Presbyterian Guild Officers And Minutes
2,264 pages in 1997
Castigator
2,062 pages from 1824 to 1835
Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, Book 1
356 pages in 1851
Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, Book 10
4 pages in 1984
Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, Book 2
380 pages in 1864
Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, Book 3
186 pages in 1884
Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, Book 4
84 pages in 1897
Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, Book 5
410 pages in 1940
Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, Book 6
22 pages in 1938
Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, Book 7
488 pages in 1904
Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, Book 8
86 pages in 1968
Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, Book 9
68 pages in 1974
Church Record Minutes
1,844 pages in 1977
Church Records, Members And Baptisms
1,824 pages in 1922
Church Register Minutes Congreg. Deacons Mins.
2,430 pages in 1997
Democrat And Journal
24 pages in 1850
Democratic Standard
236 pages from 1838 to 1850
Democratic Standard
6 pages in 1837
Democratic Union
988 pages from 1851 to 1854
Gretna Green
40 pages from 1902 to 1915
Independent Press
142 pages from 1867 to 1868
News Democrat
11,858 pages from 1897 to 2016
Presbyterian Womans Auxiliary And Missionary Minutes
2,058 pages in 1987
Ripley Saturday Budget
4 pages in 1884
Sabbath School Minutes And Records
3,126 pages from 1865 to 2001
The Aberdeen Courier
8 pages in 1901
The Adams County News
45,290 pages from 1928 to 1983
The Bee
8 pages in 1847
The Benefactor
8 pages in 1822
The Benefactor And Georgetown Advocate
8 pages in 1824
The Blue Jay
2,506 pages from 1901 to 1979
The Brown County Press
1,680 pages in 2024
The Brown County Press
10,624 pages from 2013 to 2021
The Brown County Press
61,378 pages from 1977 to 2025
The Castigator And Democratic Expositor
676 pages from 1835 to 1837
The Democratic Standard
336 pages from 1858 to 1859
The Georgetown Gazette
15,624 pages from 1905 to 1925
The Independent American
764 pages from 1854 to 1856
The National Union
40 pages from 1863 to 1867
The News Democrat
4,848 pages from 2017 to 2019
The News Democrat
175,368 pages from 1895 to 2025
The News Democrat
1,516 pages in 2021
The News Democrat
1,708 pages in 2024
The Ohio Valley Times
28 pages from 1875 to 1877
The Peoples Defender
58,640 pages from 1866 to 2025
The Political Examiner and Democratic Expositor
8 pages in 1837
The Ripley Bazoo
16 pages from 1881 to 1894
The Ripley Bee
152,716 pages from 1849 to 2025
The Ripley Bee And Times
1,938 pages from 1880 to 1887
The Ripley Daily Record
8 pages in 1900
The Ripley Herald
8 pages in 1852
The Ripley Times
72 pages from 1879 to 1880
The Semi-Weekly Defender
424 pages in 1898
The Sentinel
8 pages in 1877
The Signal
29,762 pages from 1897 to 2013
The Southern Ohio Argus
1,088 pages from 1859 to 1864
The True Jeffersonian
372 pages from 1856 to 1857
The Union
334 pages from 1860 to 1861
Weekly Hustler
8 pages in 1897
West Union Intelligencer
8 pages in 1846
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About the Library
About The Union Township Public Library
The Union Township Public Library, located in historic Ripley, Ohio, has been serving the community since its establishment. Ripley, founded in 1812, has a rich history as a key location in the Underground Railroad, home to abolitionists like Reverend John Rankin and John Parker. Today, the library continues to preserve this history and offers a wide range of services and resources to the community.
Library History
The History Of The Union Township Public Library
The library plays an integral role in preserving Ripley’s historical significance as an Underground Railroad site. Its archives include newspapers, documents, and church records, offering a wealth of information for researchers and genealogy enthusiasts.
More ways to explore and share local history
Research Guidance
Read a report in its time and place
Bring a question about Ripley, whether it begins with a family name, a neighborhood, or an event people remember. Search the newspaper titles shared by the Union Township Public Library for the details that connect a story to its time and community. The people and places in a report can make familiar local history more specific and worth exploring. Check nearby issues or another listed newspaper when available. Differences in timing and wording can add perspective to a story, while the issue date and surrounding articles help show what kind of account you are reading.
Follow a promising report into a nearby issue or another title where available. Compare dates and surrounding coverage; a single account is one perspective on a story. Use the surrounding account to shape your next question, while keeping each source's perspective distinct.
Keep the title, date, page, or item reference with each useful finding. Separate the words in a historical account from your interpretation, and note conflicting perspectives rather than choosing one too quickly. These notes help connect a local story to its evidence and show what remains uncertain.
Community Partnership
Keeping local history a community resource
This community archive is made possible by the collaboration of the Union Township Public Library, its community, and Advantage Archives. Together, these partnerships preserve local sources and give people a way to explore, learn from, and share the history around them.
Advantage Archives covers ongoing archive hosting, storage, development, and maintenance. The institution and its community do not pay a subscription, seat license, annual support contract, or other recurring archive-service charge. Local history remains a community resource, not a subscription to maintain.
Would you like to see more of your community's history preserved and accessible? Start a conversation with your library, newspaper publisher, historical or genealogical society, museum, or school about the materials they would like to share and a possible partnership with Advantage Archives.
Learn about partnerships
Stories, research tips, and archive news
Read All About It connects archive research with the people and institutions preserving local history. Explore partner and community stories, project updates, research ideas, and perspectives on digitization, education, and working with primary sources. Use the articles as a starting point for your next question or a new way to share a discovery.
May 7, 2025
Why Microfilm is still important in 2023
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Don’t Search For An Obituary By Only Searching For An “Obituary”
In the quest to trace our roots and understand our heritage, obituaries often serve as a crucial starting point. Obituaries are undoubtedly…
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April 9, 2025
Unveiling the Hidden Mysteries: Exploring Cold Cases and Unconventional Clues
Even the most esteemed police forces in the county encounter perplexing cold case files. These unsolved mysteries often leave investigators and genealogists…
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April 1, 2025
This Week in History: March 31st through April 6th
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March 24, 2025
This Week in History: March 24th through March 30th
Discover History in The Community History Archives. It has officially been a year since I started writing This Week in History,…
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March 18, 2025
It’s Your Community’s History, So Why Rent Something You Own?
We believe that history belongs to the communities where it was made - not locked behind paywalls or inaccessible due to budget restrictions. Subscription-based services and large content aggregators are generally more concerned with "content" and less concerned with the history that content contains. Their models typically involve a reoccurring charge for a plan that renews annually or licensing agreements with the library based on population served or circulation numbers. You are essentially Renting Access To YOUR History.
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