Lorain is a city in Lorain County, Ohio, United States. This city is located in northeastern Ohio on Lake Erie, at the mouth of the Black River, about 30 miles west of Cleveland. As of the 2010 Census, the city had a total population of 64,097,making it Ohio’s 10th largest city. It was first settled in 1807 and was originally named Charleston.

Ford Motor Company had the Lorain Assembly Plant in the city, mostly known for assembling the Ford Econoline (E-series) van, Ford Torino and Mercury Montego, and beginning in 1975 the Ford Thunderbird and Mercury Cougar (through 1997); the plant ceased all production on December 14, 2005 because the UAW and Ford management were unable to come to terms on a new contract. The sprawling United States Steel Mill, portions recently acquired by Republic Steel, stretch for nearly 3 miles on the city’s south side. These mills have operated in the city since 1895 and continue to employ thousands of local residents.

The City of Lorain originally began as the small village named “Mouth of Black River”, named at that time for its exact location on the west side of the mouth of the Black River (formerly called the ‘Reneshoua River’ and ‘La Riviere de la Cuiliere’). The village began to take form about 1820, primarily through the efforts of pioneer settler John S. Reid, and expanded by his son and sons-in-law who renamed the village “Charleston” in 1836, but it was shortly later again name-changed to simply “Black River” village.

By 1874, the village had grown considerably, and so was incorporated as ‘Lorain’, named for the County in which it is located. (The original records for the County do not seem to indicate why the County’s name had earlier been chosen as “Lorain”; this County being at that time, 1822, still under the jurisdiction of Huron County. However, the residents who had chosen the new County name “Lorain” (which became independent in 1824), had no direct connection to the Alsace-Loraine area of France, which later historians had theorized.)