Ohio's Largest Ethnic Groups

German is the largest ethnic group in Ohio. Over 1 in 4 Ohio residents had German roots in 2010:

Rank	Ethnicity	2010 Ohio Population	As a Percent of Total Ohio Population
	Total Population	11,536,182	100.00%
1	German	3,052,015	26.46%
2	Irish	1,625,166	14.09%
3	African-American*	1,281,363	11.11%
4	English	1,041,292	9.03%
5	American	914,236	7.92%
6	Italian	735,980	6.38%
7	Polish	442,936	3.84%
8	French, except Basque	253,999	2.20%
9	Scottish	214,649	1.86%
10	Hungarian	193,512	1.68%
11	Dutch	186,998	1.62%
12	Mexican	183,782	1.59%
13	Slovak	137,343	1.19%
14	Welsh	126,572	1.10%
15	Scotch-Irish	123,572	1.07%
16	European	108,358	0.94%
17	Puerto Rican	88,725	0.77%
18	Swiss	79,848	0.69%
19	Russian	77,054	0.67%
20	Swedish	74,989	0.65%
21	Czech	69,445	0.60%
22	Asian Indian	67,548	0.59%
23	African	60,468	0.52%
24	Greek	53,547	0.46%
25	Slovene	49,874	0.43%
26	Chinese, except Taiwanese	44,373	0.38%
27	Ukrainian	44,191	0.38%
28	Norwegian	41,360	0.36%
29	Croatian	40,042	0.35%
30	British	39,286	0.34%
31	Pennsylvania German	35,296	0.31%
32	French Canadian	30,273	0.26%
33	Lebanese	29,465	0.26%
34	Romanian	27,033	0.23%
35	Austrian	26,329	0.23%
36	Lithuanian	23,470	0.20%
37	Serbian	19,963	0.17%
38	Czechoslovakian	18,319	0.16%
39	Filipino	18,269	0.16%
40	Finnish	18,080	0.16%
41	Korean	16,269	0.14%
42	Somalian	15,131	0.13%
43	Canadian	14,480	0.13%
44	Eastern European	14,415	0.12%
45	Danish	14,341	0.12%
46	Guatemalan	12,700	0.11%
47	Vietnamese	12,632	0.11%
48	Yugoslavian	12,168	0.11%
49	Japanese	10,319	0.09%
50	Portuguese	9,918	0.09%

Source: US Census Bureau, 2010 American Community Survey

1 year estimates, tables: B02001, C02005, B02006, C02007, B03001, B03002, B04006

* African-American is derived as respondents selecting Black as racial group after removing African, West Indian, and Hispanic ethnicities.

New York's Little Syria

A lot of attention has turned to the proposed Islamic Cultural Center planned for New York's lower Manhattan, surely due to its proximity to Ground Zero. At best, many of the arguments against the center are short sighted, overlooking the neighborhood's history. At worst, many of the naysayers are pandering to xenophobia and Anti-Arab sentiment. What many don't realize is during the first half of the last century, this same section of lower Manhattan was home to “Little Syria”. This ethnic enclave was the destination of Syrian, Lebanese and Palestinian immigrants, centered on Washington Street just steps from City Hall.

At that time, the Muslim population was no greater than 5%, as most of the Arab immigrants were Christians. No mosques served the community, but rather 3 churches served the mostly Christian immigrant population. This included St. George Chapel of the Melkite Rite, inactive, but still standing 103 Washington Street.

The Little Syria neighborhood has since been razed to make way for urban renewal projects, most notably the World Trade Center and the entrance to the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel.