At the corner of Blake and Prospect in Downtown Medina sits the McDowell-Phillips House Museum. This historic home-turned-museum belonged to Elizabeth McDowell, the daughter of H.G. Blake, a 19th century Medina lawyer and member of the Ohio House of Representatives.The Medina County Historical Society spent over $700,000 to buy and restore the house in 2019. Shortly thereafter, while cleaning out the attic, Brian Feron, president of the Medina County Historical Society, says he and his team foun...

Jada Renee always knew she wanted to be a professional artist, but she didn’t have a blueprint. Things started to come together for Renee’s artistic vision once she found out her family was selling her grandmother’s home in 2020. She wanted to keep the house in the family, so she worked with her business partner to buy it.“I had to basically make a proposal to get the property,” Renee says. “[I] brought my real estate mentor at the time to come over here and assist me with the presentation. It w...

Pet shelters and animal adoption agencies across the country have been at or near capacity since the COVID-19 pandemic, and in Northeast Ohio many facilities report having more animals than new families to adopt them.Shelters and humane societies often see a cycle in adoption patterns, said Kate Lumsden, shelter coordinator at the Medina County Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) in Seville.“In the summer, you'll see a lot of kittens get adopted because it's kitten season and...

Arab-American populations are among the fastest-growing in the U.S., and Ohio has more than doubled its Arab-American population between 2000 and 2022. However, mainstream anti-Arab sentiment can be isolating for many young Arab-Americans.In part to combat negative stereotypes and isolation, media producer Rafa Saab and engineer Rania Khalaf co-founded ArabiKids, a subscription service that delivers children's books in Arabic to U.S. families. The company started in Boston, but Saab now runs the...