From settlers’ hill to a center of Black Akron
The Sherbondy families moved onto 368 acres here in 1817, in what was then Portage Township, eight years before Akron was founded. They were among the first ten families to settle the area.
During the rubber boom the hill was largely an immigrant neighborhood. Wooster Avenue’s business district was known for Jewish-owned bakeries, groceries and butchers from the 1910s through the 1930s, and the 1920 census shows Syrian, Slavic and other Eastern European families moving in. Black families arriving from the South in the early 1900s made it their home, and over time it became one of Akron’s largest Black neighborhoods.
The neighborhood played a central part in the civil rights protests of 1968. In 2002, Wooster Avenue was renamed Vernon Odom Boulevard for the civil rights leader who led the Akron Urban League for 28 years.
What the Innerbelt took
Starting around 1970, construction of the Akron Innerbelt scraped and bulldozed the neighborhood’s long eastern edge. Wikipedia’s neighborhood article puts the displacement at some 3,000 families. Black-owned businesses and homes were lost, and a business leader told Signal Akron that Wooster Avenue, once “like the Black Wall Street,” no longer has a thriving business district.
What remains is a strong sense of family history:
- Streets and places carry the names of Black leaders: Blake Place, Roulhac Circle, Vernon Odom Boulevard, Lane Field Park.
- The Odom Branch Library holds an extensive collection of Black fiction and nonfiction and gospel music.
- Bob’s Hamburg on East Avenue has served customers since the 1930s, and regulars have sat in the same seat for 45 years.
- One of the restaurant’s co-owners comes from a multi-generational Sherbondy Hill family: her grandfather built the house her father lives in, and it will be hers someday.
The Akron Zoo and Miller South School for the Visual and Performing Arts are here too, and residents can walk to Cleveland Clinic Akron General.
Selling a house your family built or kept
In a neighborhood where houses pass from grandparents to grandchildren, many sales start with an estate. Heirs may live in other cities, the house may still be in a late relative’s name, and it may need repairs nobody has made in years.
A few steps make that easier:
- Sort out title first. See selling a house when heirs disagree if siblings aren’t aligned, and our Summit County probate court guide for the court process.
- Check for tax or water liens. Our guide to water bill liens in Ohio covers how unpaid utilities can attach to the property.
- Decide whether repairs are worth it. Some houses are worth fixing before listing. Others aren’t, and a direct as-is sale saves the family the cost and the wait.
Bob can walk the house with whoever is handling the estate and put a written offer in front of all of you.