Harmony Township, Clark County

How Harmony Township, Clark County began

Harmony Township, the largest in Clark County at 51 square miles, was erected by the county commissioners on June 2, 1818, though it existed in name earlier and cast forty-one votes in a Champaign County election in 1811. The Ludlow line splits it into Congress lands to the west and Virginia military lands to the east. Its settlers, from Virginia, Kentucky, Maryland, New England, England and Switzerland, began coming about 1800 along Beaver Creek and the Little Miami; the National Road, finished through Vienna in 1837, made the villages of Harmony, Vienna, Brighton and, after 1852, Plattsburg. South Vienna, platted in 1833 as Vienna, took that name in 1909. The township had 1,846 residents in 1880 and 3,652 in 2020; the Newlove Works is on the National Register.

Settled about 1800 (John Judy Sr.); 1805-08 (Bairds, Nichelsons, Chenoweth and others), platted Lisbon 1815; Harmony 1832; Vienna 1833; Brighton 1835; Plattsburg 1852, incorporated June 2, 1818 (erected by the Clark County commissioners), by Clark County commissioners.

Where the name comes from

Not known. The 1881 county history says only that the township existed in name before 1818 and was part of Champaign County; the 1908 county history says 'how it received the name of Harmony is not now known.'

Before the town

The township lies in the area ceded by the Treaty of Greenville (August 3, 1795); the Ludlow line, which crosses it twenty degrees west of north, divides its Congress lands from the Virginia military lands. The 1881 county history records one eyewitness link to the era of the great councils: the pioneer William Baird, born in Maryland in 1762 and settled on Beaver Creek in 1805, 'attended a treaty with the Indians in 1809 at Springfield, and saw the celebrated warrior and chief Tecumseh' (the book's date; the Springfield council with Tecumseh is usually placed earlier). No village, mound or camp is described in the township. The National Register lists the Newlove Works along Newlove Road in Section 29, with its address withheld, a restriction typical of archaeological sites, but no nomination or description was found and its character is unconfirmed.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee.

• Newlove Works (other) — Section 29, along Newlove Road; address restricted by the National Register, not documented; listed June 4, 1973 (en.wikipedia.org)

Timeline

1. about 1800 — John Judy Sr., born in Basel, Switzerland about 1760, settles two miles east of the later Plattsburg.
2. 1805 — William Baird, a Revolutionary soldier born in Maryland in 1762, settles on Beaver Creek; he later told of seeing Tecumseh at a council in Springfield.
3. 1806 — John Nichelson settles on Beaver Creek; his son Andrew, three years old, grows up to buy 80 acres before he is of age.
4. 1808 — Thomas Chenoweth settles near Lisbon and lays out the village in 1815; John Craig, a Revolutionary soldier, and George Weaver, who builds a distillery some years later, also come that year.
5. 1810 — James Haney builds the first saw-mill in the township on Beaver Creek.
6. 1811 — Harmony casts forty-one votes in a Champaign County general election.
7. 1815 — Thomas Chenoweth lays out Lisbon; John Merideth, a Revolutionary soldier, becomes one of its first merchants and issues his own scrip.
8. June 2, 1818 — The Clark County commissioners erect Harmony Township; on April 25 they had attached the Madison County territory in Clark to Harmony.
9. 1832 — Laybourn Newlove lays out the village of Harmony on the National Road; the first school is taught by John Newlove in 1835.
10. 1833 — John H. Dynes lays out the village of Vienna, ten miles from Springfield on the National Road, which is not finished through it until 1837.
11. 1835 — David Ripley and Marvin Gager lay out Brighton on the National Road; the village prospers from 1836 to 1845 on wagon traffic.
12. 1838 — The post office of Vienna Cross Roads is established in the fall, with Caleb Barrett as postmaster (Wikipedia says 1840).
13. August 1850 — Cholera strikes Vienna, killing twelve people; Harmony village loses three more to it in June 1852.
14. September 30, 1852 — William Osborn and Amaziah Judy lay out Plattsburg on the Columbus & Springfield Railroad; the station is built in 1853.
15. 1871 — On August 8 an accidental explosion of powder wrecks Funston's brick storeroom in Vienna and injures nine people; it is rebuilt that year.
16. June 4, 1973 — The Newlove Works on Newlove Road in Section 29 is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
17. 1880 — The township has 1,846 residents: Vienna 170, Brighton 93, Harmony 81, Plattsburg 53 (1,929 in 1850).
18. 1909 — The post office and village of Vienna take the name South Vienna.
19. 2020 — The census counts 3,652 residents in the township.

Stories

One village, three names

John H. Dynes laid out the village of Vienna in 1833, ten miles west of Springfield on the National Road, nearly half a mile west of where the road crosses the Ludlow line. The road was surveyed but not finished until 1837. A post office was set up in the fall of 1838 under the name Vienna Cross Roads, with the storekeeper Caleb Barrett as postmaster; Wikipedia gives 1840. For nearly twenty years the Great Western mail passed daily by four-horse stage-coach, and the post office stayed in the same hands until Barrett resigned in 1858. The village took the name South Vienna only in 1909, probably to avoid confusion with other Viennas. Its fall of 1850 brought cholera: Mary Ann Barret, John Pemberton, Dr. Cyrus Dulan and nine others died.

The pike that made Brighton, and unmade it

Brighton was laid out in 1835 by David Ripley and Marvin Gager on the National Road, twelve and a half miles east of Springfield. John Buckland built the first house and kept a hotel; Joseph Robinson built the township's first steam saw-mill; Gager and Aplin opened a store; Ripley built a two-story brick hotel. A frame school opened in 1835 or 1836 and a post office, Brighton Center, in 1836 (discontinued about two years later). From 1836 to 1845, the 1881 history says, the hotels were 'crowded with wagon men, trundling the products of the West to the markets of the seaboard,' and merchants bartered and counted from morning till night. Then came railroads, the wagon trade died, and Brighton 'succumbed' and held its own barely; by 1880 it had 93 residents and no church of its own. Harmony village, six miles from Springfield, followed the same course.

The powder explosion at Vienna

On August 8, 1871, the brick storeroom on Lot 7 in Vienna, which W. S. Funston had built in 1849, was destroyed by an accidental explosion of powder. It was then occupied by James Bennett. Nine people were seriously injured: George Hinkle, David Johnson, Henry Campbell, A. H. Clark, Armsted Tavenner, Henry Baldwin, Nancy Ann Smith, Valentine Nicely and Absalom Gordon. The store was rebuilt the same year. Vienna had suffered earlier too: on November 24, 1878 fire destroyed the hewed-log house and the frame hotel on the southeast corner along with three dwellings.

Photographs

Local history sources: en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org · archive.org · archive.org · en.wikipedia.org · commons.wikimedia.org

Mostly private wells The water here

• South Charleston Village64% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Springfield City14% of residentsMad River Buried Valley Aquifer (12 wells)
• South Vienna Village8% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Harmony Estates Mobile Home Park7% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Brookside Village MHP4% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Clark County Northridge1% of residentsMad River Buried Valley Aquifer (12 wells)
• Clark County Limecrest0% of residentsMad River Buried Valley Aquifer (12 wells)
• Clark County Lawrenceville0% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Chateau Estates MHP0% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• North Hampton Village0% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Rolling Terrace MHP0% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)

Fire and EMS stations (1)

Spills reported since 2021 (7)

Money issues on the ballot since 2018: 1 of 2 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 2025-11-06

Cite this page