Emergency Crime Scene and Biohazard Cleanup in Ashtabula, OH

Ashtabula is the most populous city in Ashtabula County, Ohio, sitting at the mouth of the Ashtabula River on Lake Erie about 53 miles northeast of Cleveland.

The name Ashtabula comes from a Lenape word meaning "always enough fish to be shared around."

The site of Ashtabula was first settled by European Americans in 1803, and the city was incorporated in 1891.

Ashtabula had 17,975 people at the 2020 census, down from a peak of 24,559 in 1960 as industrial jobs declined.

The 2020 census counted 7,577 households in Ashtabula, and fewer than half of its homes - 48.3% - were owner-occupied.

Ashtabula was an important destination on the Underground Railroad, and its Hubbard House, one of the few surviving termination points, hid freedom seekers in its basement before they boarded boats across Lake Erie to Canada.

From the late 19th century, Ashtabula's harbor grew into a major Lake Erie port for coal and for iron ore shipped from Minnesota's Mesabi Range to steel mills.

On December 29, 1876, Ashtabula was the site of one of America's worst rail disasters, when a bridge over the Ashtabula River collapsed under the Pacific Express, killing 92 of the 159 people aboard.

In 1915, Ashtabula became the first city in the United States to adopt proportional representation voting, a system it used until the early 1930s.

Ashtabula's industry drew large numbers of immigrants from Finland, Sweden and Italy, and the city hosted FinnFestUSA, a national celebration of Finnish Americans, in 2007.