Franklin Township, Shelby County

How Franklin Township, Shelby County began

Franklin Township lies in the second tier of Shelby County townships and is crossed by the 1795 Greenville Treaty line, with about a third of its sections north of the line and the rest south of it. Samuel Blakeley settled here in 1830, and Reformed and Lutheran families, among them the Swanders and Schlossers, organized churches in 1832 and shared a log church on the Wapakoneta road from 1834. The township was organized in 1835, and the paper town of Woodstock was laid out the next year but never grew. The Dayton and Michigan Railroad brought a flag station named for James Swander, and the northern part of Anna lies in the township; the rest is farmland drained by Plum and Turtle creeks.

Settled 1830, incorporated 1835 (township organized), by early settler Samuel Blakeley.

Where the name comes from

No source located gives a specific documented reason Franklin Township took its name; it is one of twenty-one townships of that name in Ohio, a pattern consistent with the widespread early-19th-century practice of naming townships for Benjamin Franklin, but no source confirms this township's own naming rationale.

Before the town

The Greenville Treaty line of 1795 crosses Franklin Township. The 1883 county history counts six full and six fractional sections north of the line and twelve full and four fractional sections south of it, and Wesley Chapel's site was still given in 1882 as section 36 'north of boundary line.' Land south of the line was ceded by the Treaty of Greenville; land north of it was ceded later, and the 1883 history prints the 1817 treaty at the Foot of the Rapids (the Treaty of Fort Meigs), in which the Wyandot cession ran south to this line between Fort Lawrence and Loramie's store. No Native village or mound inside the township is named in the county histories. Shawnee, Miami, Wyandot and other nations were present across Shelby County before 1800.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee, Miami, Wyandot.

• Greenville Treaty line (treaty) — crosses Franklin Township east to west, leaving six full and six fractional sections to the north, 1795 (archive.org)

Timeline

1. 1819 — Shelby County, in which Franklin Township lies, is organized from Miami County.
2. 1830 — Samuel Blakeley of Franklin County, Ohio, settled in Franklin Township, moving north into Dinsmore Township two years later.
3. 1832 — Rev. John Pence organized the Reformed Church society in September at Jacob Schlosser's house, with the Schlosser, Swander, Hartman, Woodring and Carmany families.
4. 1833 — Lutheran settlers, helped by their Reformed neighbors, built a log house for Rev. J. H. F. Joesting that served as parsonage, school and church for the St. James congregation.
5. 1833 — Rev. Thomas Simmes organized the Wesley Chapel Methodist Episcopal society at Philip Young's house with seven members; its chapel on the Murphy Pike was built between 1843 and 1847.
6. 1834 — The Reformed and Lutheran societies built a union hewed-log church, 25 by 30 feet, on the Wapakoneta road about two and a half miles south of Anna.
7. 1835 — Franklin Township is organized as one of Shelby County's fourteen townships.
8. 1836-05-26 — Damniett Cole was commissioned as the township's first recorded justice of the peace.
9. 1836-06-30 — Woodstock, a town of sixty-four lots, was laid out for Lindsley Tunis in section 33; by 1883 it existed only on paper.
10. 1839 — Rev. David Warnock organized the Plum Creek Methodist Episcopal society in February with fifteen members; its frame church three miles north of Sidney was dedicated in November 1860.
11. 1845 — The Reformed society sold its share of the union church to the Lutherans, reportedly for seventy-three dollars, and built its own frame church in 1846-47.
12. 1854 — The St. James Lutheran congregation built a brick church near the old log church; in 1871 it moved to a new church in Anna.
13. 1861 — The Dayton and Michigan Railroad opened a flag station named for James Swander, who became agent and first postmaster of Swander's Crossing (the 1913 history dates the station and post office to 1867).
14. 1868 — Henry Smith built a steam sawmill at Swander's Crossing, later run by James Swander and then by Bulle and Minniear.
15. 1877 — The village of Anna, whose northern part lies within Franklin Township, is incorporated.
16. 1881 — Killian and Ludlum's tile yards at Swander's Crossing burned twenty-three kilns, about 13,800 rods of drain tile, in one summer.
17. 1913 — Swanders had about eighty-six residents, and the grain elevator of W. M. Alton and Son was the leading business in the township.

Stories

One log church for two congregations

In September 1832 Rev. John Pence organized a German Reformed society at Jacob Schlosser's house, and Lutheran families who arrived in 1832 and 1833 formed a congregation under Rev. J. H. F. Joesting. In 1834 the two groups together built a hewed-log church, 25 by 30 feet, on the Wapakoneta road about two and a half miles south of Anna, and met there on alternate Sundays. The arrangement lasted about twelve years. In 1845 the Reformed members sold their share of the church, ground and books to the Lutherans, reportedly for seventy-three dollars, and in 1846-47 built their own frame church a short distance south. The Lutherans, increasingly immigrants from Baden, built a brick church near the old site in 1854 and moved to Anna in 1871, and the old ground became their graveyard.

Swander's Crossing

James Swander's family was among the founders of the Reformed church in 1832, and when the Dayton and Michigan Railroad set a flag station about five miles north of Sidney, the company named it for him and made him its agent. He applied for a post office, became its first postmaster and opened the first dry-goods store. The 1883 history dates the station and post office to 1861, the 1913 history to 1867. The village was never formally surveyed; by 1882 it had twelve to fifteen houses, two stores, a sawmill, a wagon shop and Killian and Ludlum's tile yards, whose patent kiln was the only one of its kind in the county. By 1913 the tile yards were gone and a grain elevator was the main business.

Photographs

Local history sources: en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · familysearch.org

Mostly private wells The water here

• Sidney City76% of residentsGroundwater wells (Great Miami River valley + Washington Twp) with Tawawa Creek/Miami R. backup
• Anna Village18% of residentsGroundwater wells (3 wells)
• Mccartyville Well Association4% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Shelby County Water and Sewer2% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Kettlersville Well Association1% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)

Bridges rated poor (1)

Facilities reporting toxic releases (1)

Spills reported since 2021 (3)

Money issues on the ballot since 2023: 1 of 1 passed.

Ballot issues

Elections for office

Winners in bold. Results from the county board of elections' official canvass unless marked.

Auditor of State record

• No fiscal caution, watch or emergency on the Auditor of State's lists.
• Financial Audit, 2023 to 2024, released 2026-06-25

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