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Kent is a city in Portage County, Ohio, United States. The population was
27,906 at the 2000 census. Kent is home to the main campus of Kent State
University. Nearby metropolitan areas include Akron, Cleveland, and Canton. Kent
is included in the Akron metropolitan area for census purposes.
Although European settlers had begun settling in the area by the 1700s, Kent was
founded in 1805 by John Haymaker, who moved west from Pittsburgh and settled on
the banks of the Cuyahoga River. After Haymaker built a gristmill, two villages
quickly sprung up. The "upper" village was named Carthage and the "lower"
village was named Franklin and later Franklin Mills. The region was formerly
inhabited by various tribes of American Indians, and around 1780 the Indian
fighter Captain Samuel Brady achieved notoriety for his activities in the area,
including his famous leap over the Cuyahoga River to avoid capture.
When construction began on the Pennsylvania and Ohio Canal in the 1830s, land
speculation was rampant in many areas of Northeast Ohio along the canal,
including Franklin Mills and Carthage. As a result of this, an industrial and
business region was established along the river in what is now downtown Kent.
The era of the canal would be relatively short-lived. In 1863 a local
businessman by the name of Marvin Kent was influential in bringing the Atlantic
& Great Western Railroad through the village. The railroad reinvented the
village as an important stop on the east-west line, and to honor Marvin Kent the
village was renamed Kent in 1864, although this change was not official until
1867. As for the canal, it could not compete with the speed and efficiency of
the railroads, and it became virtually unused for shipping by 1870. Kent was
officially incorporated as a village on May 6, 1867.
John Davey established the Davey Tree Company in 1880 after planting hundreds of
trees around the city. Kent became known as the "Tree City". Another of the
city's oldest businesses, the Williams Brothers Mill, was also founded in the
late 1800s; now operating under the name Star of the West, it is a flour mill
specializing in the preparation of custom-ground wheat flours. In the
mid-twentieth century, two factories produced buses, delivery trucks, and other
similar vehicles, but these factories went out of business by the late 20th
century.
In 1910, the "Kent State Normal School" was established as a college for
training public school teachers. The school was later renamed Kent State
University after it received authorization to issue Bachelor of Arts and
Bachelor of Science degrees.
The 1930s brought the Great Depression and the closing of the railroads through
Kent. By this time, however, Kent State University was firmly established and
today nearly the entire Kent economy is in some way associated with the
university.
On May 4, 1970, four students were killed and nine were wounded by the National
Guard at the Kent State shootings.
Today, Kent has a relatively diverse population, due in part to the university,
as well as a downtown area which is slowly growing and recovering from a period
of relative non-development. Currently, a recently finished renovation of the
old dam on the Cuyahoga River, new condominiums, a new library project, and a
plan for adding new blocks of businesses to the downtown district are planned in
and around the historical city center.
Some Things to Consider When Looking for an Apartment...
When searching for a new apartment make sure to take your time to think
through what are the most important things to you in an apartment and plan your
search based on those priorities. Here are some things to consider when planning
your move:
1. Consider the areas where you would like to live
* What is the crime rate?
* If you have children - what rating does the local school system have?
* Is there area convenient shopping, health and recreation services in the area?
2. Make a list of your housing priorities
* Do you have pets?
* Do you need parking?
* Do you need to be on the ground floor?
* What amenities are important to you - swimming pool, fitness room, in unit
laundry?
3. Evaluate the building
* What is the condition of the unit and building?
* Are the grounds maintained?
* Are windows, steps, and railings in good condition?
* View the property at night. Is it safe and well lit?
4. The security of the property
* Are there security service? When is the guard on duty?
* Does the building have controlled access?
* Does each unit have secure door and window locks?
5. Talk to the neighbors
* Ask other residents whether they are satisfied with the building.
6. Amenities
* Who is allowed to use the amenities?
* When are they open?
* Are the fees charged to use those facilities included in rent?
7. Ask about Utilities
* Does the owner or tenant pay the utility bills?
* Are any utilities included with monthly rent?
* Do units have separate thermostats to control heat and air conditioning?
8. Review the lease
* How much notice must you give before moving out?
* Can the rent be increased? If so, by how much and how often?
* Are pets allowed?
* What is the security deposit and cleaning costs upon move out?
* What is the responsibility of tenants for damage to property?
* Is there a penalty for breaking a lease?
9. Information too bring to a lease signing
* Credit Report
* Pay stubs/tax returns
* Reference
* Application
More Apartment Information
An apartment (or flat in Britain and most other Commonwealth countries) is a
self-contained housing unit that occupies only part of a building. Apartments
may be owned (by an owner-occupier) or rented (by tenants).
Some apartment-dwellers own their apartments, either as co-ops, in which the
residents own shares of a corporation that owns the building or development; or
in condominiums, whose residents own their apartments and share ownership of the
public spaces. Most apartments are in buildings designed for the purpose, but
large older houses are sometimes divided into apartments. The word apartment
connotes a residential unit or section in a building. Apartment building owners,
lessors, or managers often use the more general word units to refer to
apartments. Units can be used to refer to rental business suites as well as
residential apartments. When there is no tenant occupying an apartment, the
lessor is said to have a vacancy. For apartment lessors, each vacancy represents
a loss of income from rent-paying tenants for the time the apartment is vacant
(i.e., unoccupied). Lessors' objectives are often to minimize the vacancy rate
for their units. The owner of the apartment typically transfers possession to
the occupant by giving him/her the key to the apartment entrance door and any
other keys need to live there, such as a common key to the building or any other
common areas, and an individual unit mailbox key. When the occupant move out,
these keys should typically be returned to the owner.
Apartments can be classified into several types. Studio, efficiency, bed-sit, or
bachelor apartments tend to be the smallest apartments with the cheapest rents
in a given area. These kinds of apartment usually consist mainly of a large room
which is the living, dining, and bedroom combined. There are usually kitchen
facilities as part of this central room, but the bathroom is its own smaller
separate room. Moving up from the efficiencies are one-bedroom apartments where
one bedroom is a separate room from the rest of the apartment. Then there are
two-bedroom, three-bedroom, etc. apartments. Small apartments often have only
one entrance/exit. Large apartments often have two entrances/exits, perhaps a
door in the front and another in the back. Depending on the building design, the
entrance/exit doors may be directly to the outside or to a common area inside,
such as a hallway. Depending on location, apartments may be available for rent
furnished with furniture or unfurnished into which a tenant usually moves in
with his/her own furniture. Permanent carpeting is often included in an
apartment.
Laundry facilities are usually kept in a separate area accessible to all the
tenants in the building. Depending on when the building was built and the design
of the building, utilities such as water, heating, and electric may be common
for all the apartments in the building or separate for each apartment and billed
separately to each tenant (however, many areas in the US have ruled it illegal
to split a water bill among all the tenants, especially if a pool is on the
premises). Outlets for connection to telephones are typically included in
apartments. Telephone service is optional and is practically always billed
separately from the rent payments. Cable television and similar amenities are
extra also. Parking space, air conditioner, and extra storage space may or may
not be included with an apartment. Rental leases often limit the maximum number
of people who can reside in each apartment. On or around the ground floor of the
apartment building, a series of mailboxes are typically kept in a location
accessible to the public and, thus, to the letter-carrier too. Every unit
typically gets its own mailbox with individual keys to it. Some very large
apartment buildings with a full-time staff may take mail from the mailman and
provide mail-sorting service. Near the mailboxes or some other location
accessible by outsiders, there may be a buzzer (equivalent to a doorbell) for
each individual unit. In smaller apartment buildings such as two- or
three-flats, or even four-flats, garbage is often disposed of in trash
containers similar to those used at houses. In larger buildings, garbage is
often collected in a common trash bin or dumpster. For cleanliness or minimizing
noise, many lessors will place restrictions on tenants regarding keeping pets in
an apartment.
In some parts of the world, the word apartment is used generally to refer to a
new purpose-built self-contained residential unit in a building, whereas the
word flat means a converted self-contained unit in an older building. An
industrial, warehouse, or commercial space converted to an apartment is commonly
called a loft.
When part of a house is converted for the ostensible use of a landlord's family
member, the unit may be known as an in-law apartment or granny flat, though
these (sometimes illegally) created units are often occupied by ordinary renters
rather than family members. In Canada these suites are commonly located in the
basements of houses and are therefore normally called basement suites.
Staying in privately owned apartments rather than in a hotel is quickly becoming
popular with travelers.