Oxford is the quintessential American college town, tucked into the rolling farmland of southwest Ohio between Dayton and Cincinnati. Miami University — a public university often called a "public Ivy" — dominates the town and gives it a character far larger than its population would suggest. Robert Frost called it "the most beautiful campus that ever there was," and the uniform Georgian Revival architecture makes a good case.
The centre of town sits uphill from campus, so locals call it "uptown" rather than downtown. Brick streets, mature trees and a row of independent shops and restaurants in historic commercial buildings make it one of the more pleasant small-town main streets in the Midwest. The William Holmes McGuffey House is worth a visit — McGuffey wrote his landmark schoolbooks here, and over 120 million copies were sold.
Oxford also carries a piece of civil rights history most visitors don't know about. In June 1964, the Western College campus was where over a thousand Freedom Summer volunteers trained before heading to Mississippi. Three of them — Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner — were murdered after leaving Oxford.
If you are passing through the Dayton or Cincinnati area, Oxford makes for an easy day trip — good food, lively bars, and whatever event the university happens to be hosting that weekend.