Jackson Township, Auglaize County

How Jackson Township, Auglaize County began

Jackson Township holds the village of Minster, founded September 1, 1832, when a Cincinnati stock company of 97 German immigrants led by Francis Joseph Stallo bought a section of land and platted it as Stallostown; a plat drawing found decades later in a downtown trash barrel is now in the Minster Historical Society Museum. Stallo died of cholera in 1833 before deeding out the shares, and the town was renamed Minster in 1836, honoring the Catholic region of Munster, Westphalia, home to many settlers. The settlement grew along an old Native trail between Loramie Creek and the St. Marys River, survived a cholera epidemic that killed more than 250 people in 1849, and was carried onto the Miami and Erie Canal by 1843, which brought Cincinnati-bound trade and reinforced its Catholic German character. Originally part of Mercer County, the township passed to the new Auglaize County at its creation in 1848. It remains centered on Minster's canal-era downtown and its churches and schools.

Settled 1832, platted 1833-06-11, incorporated 1839-03-05, by Francis Joseph Stallo and a Cincinnati stock company of 97 German immigrants.

Where the name comes from

Minster was platted in 1833 as 'Stallostown' for its founder Francis (Franz) Joseph Stallo, then renamed Minster in 1836 both to honor the heavily Catholic region of Munster in Westphalia, Germany, from which many settlers came, and, per the local historical society, to mark Stallo's own death.

Before the town

No site-specific villages or mounds are documented within Jackson Township itself, but the ground Minster was built on lay along a Native trail that ran from Loramie Creek to the St. Marys River, used by Indians and traders before white settlement; local histories describe the site as 'a virgin forest with many swamps' crossed by that wilderness trail. The township sits within the broader area the Shawnee and Miami used and claimed before the treaties of the early 1800s pushed cession lines north and west.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee, Miami.

• Loramie-St. Marys trail (trail) — through the future site of Minster, Jackson Township, pre-1832 (minsteroh.com)

Timeline

1. 1832-09-01 — A stock company of 97 Germans forms in Cincinnati to buy a section of land in what was then Mercer County, later Auglaize County.
2. 1832-09-28 — Francis Joseph Stallo, the company's leader, buys one section (640 acres) at the Piqua land office for $1.25 an acre.
3. 1833-04-14 — The 144 shares of the new town, already divided in late 1832, are subdivided into ten-lot sections and assigned to members by random drawing at a Cincinnati meeting.
4. 1833-06-11 — The plat of Stallostown is recorded in Mercer County; the original plat map, lost for decades, was found in a downtown trash barrel in the 1920s and is now displayed at the Minster Historical Society Museum.
5. 1833-07-26 — Francis Joseph Stallo dies of cholera without having deeded out the shares; a Mercer County chancery suit in 1836 orders his heirs to convey the lots to the original purchasers.
6. 1836 — The town is renamed Minster, after Munster, Westphalia, home region of many of the settlers.
7. 1839-03-05 — Minster is incorporated as a village.
8. 1843-1845 — The first Miami and Erie Canal packet boat reaches Minster in 1843; construction of the Loramie Reservoir and the canal is completed in 1845, opening Cincinnati-bound canal trade.
9. 1848 — Minster and Jackson Township pass from Mercer County into the newly organized Auglaize County.
10. 1849 — A cholera epidemic devastates Minster, killing more than 250 people.
11. 1979-07-26 — Egypt Catholic Church and Rectory (St. Joseph's Catholic Church, Egypt), at the junction of Minster-Egypt Road and State Route 364 in Jackson Township, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Stories

Stallostown on the wilderness trail

Before Minster existed, the ground was virgin forest and swamp crossed by a single wilderness trail running from Loramie Creek to the St. Marys River, a route Native people and traders had used for generations. In 1832, a Cincinnati stock company of 97 German immigrants entrusted Francis Joseph Stallo to buy a section of this land and hold it until it could be divided among them by lot. Stallo bought the section that September, and by the next spring the 144 shares had been drawn and the plat of Stallostown recorded, but Stallo himself died of cholera before he could deed out a single lot, leaving a Mercer County court to settle the shares among his infant children's guardians and the original purchasers. Four years after the founding, the settlers renamed their village Minster, for Munster in Westphalia, the Catholic region many of them had left behind; the town's founding plat map disappeared for nearly a century until a Minster historian found it discarded in a trash barrel downtown in the 1920s.

Local history sources: minsteroh.com · archive.org · auglaizecountyhistory.org · en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org

Every historic place in Auglaize County on the full map

Groundwater wells (8 wells) The water here

• Minster Village92% of residentsGroundwater wells (8 wells)
• West Lake Village MHP3% of residentsGroundwater wells (1 wells)
• Fort Loramie Village2% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Shelby County Water and Sewer1% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Lake View Village MHP1% of residentsGroundwater wells (1 wells)
• New Bremen Village0% of residentsGroundwater wells (6 wells)

Power plants (2)

Spills reported since 2021 (2)

Who holds office

Roster as of 2026-09-18: county board of elections.

Elections for office

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

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