Painesville, Ohio, United States

🇺🇸 Painesville is a city in and the county seat of Lake County, Ohio, United States, located along the Grand River 27 miles (43 km)

Painesville is the home of Lake Erie College, Morley Library, and the 284-acre (115 ha) Historic Downtown Painesville Recreation Area.

History Painesville was settled shortly after the American Revolutionary War. It was still considered part of the Connecticut Western Reserve. General Edward Paine (1746–1841), a native of Bolton, Connecticut, who had served as a captain in the Connecticut militia during the war, and John Walworth arrived in 1800 with a party of sixty-six settlers, among the first in the Western Reserve. General Paine later represented the region in the territorial legislature of the Northwest Territory.

In 1800 the Western Reserve became Trumbull County and at the first Court of Quarter Sessions, the county was divided into eight townships. The smallest of these townships was named Painesville, for General Paine, and encompassed what later became the townships of Perry, Leroy, Hambden, Concord, Chardon, Mentor, and Kirtland. The township government was organized in 1802. The post office in Painesville was opened in 1803 with John Walworth as postmaster.

In what was to become the commercial centre of the township was a settlement called Oak Openings, its name being descriptive of the scrub oaks and sandy soil. It was here in 1805 that Gen. Henry Champion laid out a village plat and called it Champion, a name that it carried only until incorporation in 1832, when the name "Painesville" was chosen in honor of General Paine. Two of his descendants, Eleazer A. Paine and Halbert E. Paine, later served as Union Army generals during the American Civil War.

In 1840, Lake County was created from portions of Geauga and Cuyahoga Counties, and Painesville was made the county seat and a courthouse erected. In 1852, the community of Painesville became a village, and in 1902 the village attained city status.

Geography Painesville has a total area of 7.01 square miles (18.15 km²), of which 6.83 square miles (17.68 km²) are land and 0.18 square miles (0.47 km²), or 2.59%, are water.

Painesville and Concord townships, along with the village of Fairport Harbor and the city of Mentor, are adjacent to Painesville.

Education Public education in the city of Painesville is provided by the Painesville City Schools, which includes Red Raider Preschool; Chestnut Elementary School, Elm Street Elementary School, and Maple Elementary School (all grades K–5); Heritage Middle School (grades 6–8) and Thomas W. Harvey High School (grades 9–12).

Hershey Montessori School is Painesville's independent school option that educates students from birth through sixth grade. Its seventh through twelfth grade campus is located in nearby Huntsburg, Ohio.

The city is also home to Lake Erie College, a private liberal arts college enrolling approximately 1,200 students. The college offers over 60 undergraduate programs and master's programs. The former Andrews Osborne Academy's Painesville campus became part of Lake Erie College in 2008.

Economy The largest employers are the city government, county government, and the public school systems. Other notable employers include a number of manufacturing companies such as Avery Dennison, Mar-Bal Corp., Lubrizol, AeroControlex, Guyer Precision, Eckart America and Meritec.

Ranpak's headquarters was in Painesville until it moved to nearby Concord, Ohio.