Monroe Township, Muskingum County, Ohio

Monroe Township, Muskingum County, Ohio
Township

Location of Monroe Township in Muskingum County
Coordinates: 40°6′54″N 81°46′5″W / 40.11500°N 81.76806°W / 40.11500; -81.76806Coordinates: 40°6′54″N 81°46′5″W / 40.11500°N 81.76806°W / 40.11500; -81.76806
Country United States
State Ohio
County Muskingum
Area
 • Total 24.9 sq mi (64.6 km2)
 • Land 24.7 sq mi (64.0 km2)
 • Water 0.2 sq mi (0.5 km2)
Elevation[1] 801 ft (244 m)
Population (2000)
 • Total 439
 • Density 17.8/sq mi (6.9/km2)
Time zone Eastern (EST) (UTC-5)
 • Summer (DST) EDT (UTC-4)
FIPS code 39-51506[2]
GNIS feature ID 1086727[1]

Monroe Township is one of the twenty-five townships of Muskingum County, Ohio, United States. The 2000 census found 439 people in the township.[3]

Geography

Located in the northeastern corner of the county, it borders the following townships:

No municipalities are located in Monroe Township.

Name and history

Monroe Township was named for James Monroe, 5th President of the United States.[4] It is one of twenty-two Monroe Townships statewide.[5]

By the 1830s, Monroe Township contained three saw mills and three gristmills.[6]

The Muskingum County Commissioners set the township aside on July 2, 1819. Though some settlers had come before this date, the area was not formerly recognized as Monroe township before that date. Like it's neighboring townships, it was created from the larger Highland township that existed prior to 1819. The largest population center was Otsego, which was built on the site of an Indian village. Wills creek runs through the northern part of the township and was traversable by canoe to the Muskingum River in Adams Mills, up-river from Dresden, Ohio. Many settlers followed the creek to Monroe and the area was well known among the early pioneers for it's game.

Many of the early settlers had to carve their own trails to the township. Some came by canoe up the Wills Creek to White Eyes Creek. This being the end of their journey, the beginning starting in Marietta, up the Muskingum past Dresden to Wills Creek. Others would later disembark at Marquand Mills and follow what roads had by then been cut to whatever tract of land they had managed to obtain. Some came by covered wagon led by horses or oxen from Cambridge or via the Wheeling road through Union and Highland townships. It should be mentioned that these early settlers found the area heavily forested and had to clear their land before they could begin to farm it. The first few winters were tough as some crops failed and if it weren’t for the abundant game and their skills as hunters, they would have starved. At the same time they were clearing their land, hunting and starting their farms, they also had to deal with some Indians that remained hostile as well as some white men who saw an opportunity to prey on the poorly defended settlers. It was a hard life and through it all, many of these early settlers lived very long lives. A few early pioneers such as Charles Marquand and James Sprague lived into their nineties. These were sturdy men well deserving of the name pioneer.

Otsego, the largest populated area of Monroe township, was built on the sight of an old Indian village. It has never been incorporated but has served as the only trading center in Monroe since 1838. James Sprague first owned the land the village was built on. He had later sold parts of the land to Francis Wires and Moses Abbott. James Boyle laid out the town when he was a surveyor for Muskingum County. The eastern half of the village was from the Moses Abbot's land and the eastern portion was taken from the tract of Francis Wires. The name Otsego was taken from a town by the same name in New York by Dr. Alonzo Delameter who had built a store there in 1837 with his brother Ralph. David Richardson built the first hotel in the township in Otsego in 1837.

Otsego saw much traffic as it stood on the crossroads of two of the widely used roads of the day. Route 93 and Route 83 converge in the village and also White Eyes Creek flows past it and was used for transportation in the early years before the roads were built. James Sprague and his sons built the first road in 1811-1812 to travel to Dresden. The first road to be surveyed, by Charles Roberts, was cut in 1815 from James Lindley's mill on Crooked Creek in Union Township, Muskingum County, Ohio to the mouth of Wills Creek. The next road was cut in 1817 from Col. John Reynolds’s store on the Wheeling road in Union township to James Sprague's land in Otsego. The surveyor for that road was Joseph K. McCune. A road was later cut to Adamsville, Ohio and would later become route 93. [7]

Government

The township is governed by a three-member board of trustees, who are elected in November of odd-numbered years to a four-year term beginning on the following January 1. Two are elected in the year after the presidential election and one is elected in the year before it. There is also an elected township fiscal officer,[8] who serves a four-year term beginning on April 1 of the year after the election, which is held in November of the year before the presidential election. Vacancies in the fiscal officership or on the board of trustees are filled by the remaining trustees.

References

  1. 1 2 "US Board on Geographic Names". United States Geological Survey. 2007-10-25. Retrieved 2008-01-31.
  2. ↑ "American FactFinder". United States Census Bureau. Retrieved 2008-01-31.
  3. ↑ Muskingum County, Ohio — Population by Places Estimates Ohio State University, 2007. Accessed 15 May 2007.
  4. ↑ Everhart, F.J. (1882). 1794. History of Muskingum County, Ohio, with illustrations and biographical sketches of prominent men and pioneers. F.J. Everhart & Co. p. 456.
  5. ↑ "Detailed map of Ohio" (PDF). United States Census Bureau. 2000. Retrieved 2007-02-16.
  6. ↑ Kilbourn, John (1833). "The Ohio Gazetteer, or, a Topographical Dictionary". Scott and Wright. p. 319. Retrieved 12 December 2013.
  7. ↑ "Monroe Early History". Monroe History. Retrieved 8 August 2016.
  8. ↑ §503.24, §505.01, and §507.01 of the Ohio Revised Code. Accessed 4/30/2009.

External links

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