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City of Lima

Lima in Myth and Legend

According to legend, the town was named for Lima, capital city of Peru. However, it is not pronounced the same. Early elected officials gathered at James Daniel's cabin in 1830 to select a name for their town. Daniels was an Allen County Commissioner. Several names were written on pieces of paper and placed in a hat. Patrick G. Goode, a Judge from Montgomery County, noticed a crate with a shipping label from Lima, Peru. His paper was pulled from the hat. Malaria was a common disease of the early Black Swamp area, and quinine was shipped to northwest Ohio from Peru . The white powdery substance, which reduced fever and chills, was generously applied to whatever was served at the dinner table.

Three local stories speak to the conservative politics of Lima and Allen County. One tells how, in the 1950s, the local newspaper editorialized against a public library on the libertarian grounds that if a person wanted to read a book, he should go out and buy one. Also in the 1950s, Lima 's conservative town fathers refused to take any federal urban renewal dollars because, it is said, they did not trust Washington politicians. Finally, Allen County residents claim to be the only Ohio county to go for Republican Barry Goldwater in the 1964 Goldwater-Johnson presidential election.

Lima is sometimes used as the typical Midwestern American town. The town's opera house was a prominent spot on the Vaudeville circuit of the 1920s and 1930s. Reputedly, Lima audiences were so unreceptive to the humor that "Lima" became an inside joke among performers for an unpleasant or unproductive engagement. The joke "first prize, one week in.../ second prize, two weeks in..." was originally about Lima. Comedian Lenny Bruce had a routine called "Lima , Ohio" in his act, based on a booking he had there as a young comedian. Spencer Tracy played the Faurot Opera House for a season in the 1920s. In Lima for four months, Tracy was frustrated and afraid that New York producers would forget about him. In 1954, when he was filming Bad Day at Black Rock in a desolate desert town in California, someone said this must be the worst place in the world to be stuck in. Tracy said, "Then you've never been to Lima, Ohio".

Lead character Catherine Banning, played by Rene Russo, in the 1999 remake of the 1968 film The Thomas Crown Affair claimed her father was from Lima. Scriptwriters Leslie Dixon and Kurt Wimmer had a friend from Lima , so they worked the name into their script. The actor pronounced it incorrectly, as "Lee-mah."

Locals tell a story that explains how Lima got a hospital for the criminally insane instead of a university. According to the story, early in the 20th century, Ohio state officials in Columbus asked Lima's town fathers which would they rather have, a state university or a hospital for the criminally insane. In their wisdom, Lima leaders chose the hospital. So Lima got Lima Correctional Institution, and Bowling Green , fifty miles north, got Bowling Green State University. The story, of course, is not true. The two institutions were not built at the same time.

A documentary titled Lost in Middle America (and What Happened Next) (PBS) was made about Lima, Ohio, the acronym for its title being "LIMA". It focused on the Rust Belt economic crisis, showing how Lima's blue-collar industries fell, how the crisis was a typical experience of cities across the United States and Lima's subsequent recovery.

The Cold War left its mark on Lima, also. Most Lima residents firmly believed that their hometown was very high--in the top 5, the story usually went--on the top secret list of places the Russians planned to bomb. Because of the oil industry and the tank plant, most people accepted this as at least a possibility, and baby boomers were certain that they would not need to learn to "duck and cover" because they were at ground zero with no chance of survival.