Lenox Township, Ashtabula County

How Lenox Township, Ashtabula County began

Lenox Township, number ten of the third range of the Connecticut Western Reserve, was first called Millerstown for the landowner Ashur Miller and renamed Lenox in 1813, 'presumably' for Lenox, Massachusetts. Title confusion delayed settlement until Lisle Asque of Maryland built a bark hut on June 10, 1807, one of several families lured from Washington, D.C. by Gideon Granger's promise of a tobacco industry, nearly all of whom soon left. Erastus N. House and Levi French of Berkshire County, Massachusetts came in 1811; the township organized in December 1819 and held its first election on January 17, 1820. Cheese, a cornet band that went to the Civil War, and a cyclone fill its record; the 1825 Col. Erastus House house is on the National Register. The township had 1,374 residents in 2020.

Settled June 1807 (Lisle Asque and family, first lasting settlers), platted 1807-1809 (Granger tract subdivided into 100-acre lots by T. R. Hawley; Rockwell tract surveyed by Charles Parker), incorporated December 13, 1819 (organization ordered); January 17, 1820 (first township election held), by Lisle Asque, from Maryland; land originally deeded to Oliver Phelps in 1795, later divided between Ashur Miller and Gideon Granger Jr..

Where the name comes from

The township was first called Millerstown for Ashur Miller of Middletown, Connecticut, who bought its southern part in March 1800. In 1813 the name was changed to Lenox, 'presumably from the town of that name in Massachusetts,' the 1924 county history says; the 1878 history gives no reason. The early settlers Erastus N. House and Levi French came from Sandisfield, Berkshire County, Massachusetts.

Before the town

No Native village, trail or mound within Lenox Township is recorded in the county histories read. The 1878 history notes the first white persons to enter it were the survey party that in 1796 laid out the four eastern meridians of the Reserve. The township lies east of the Cuyahoga River in the Connecticut Western Reserve, where Native title was cleared by the Treaty of Greenville in 1795. Elsewhere in the county, the record includes the Whittlesey-culture villages at Conneaut, the Mississauga village there of about 1747, and the county's legends.

Timeline

1. September 5, 1795 — The State of Connecticut deeds the township to Oliver Phelps as agent of the Connecticut Land Company.
2. 1796 — The party surveying the four eastern meridians of the Reserve are, without doubt, the first white persons in the township.
3. March 4, 1800 — Granger and Phelps deed the southern 12,678 acres to Ashur Miller, giving the name Millerstown; mortgages, quitclaims and a foreclosure suit follow, and the Rockwells take the tract in December 1814.
4. 1806-1807 — Gideon Granger induces families from Washington, D.C. to settle in Lenox and Jefferson as tobacco growers; nearly all leave after a short stay.
5. June 10, 1807 — Lisle Asque, from Maryland, enters a bark-and-pole hut with his wife and four children; six weeks later they move into the first log house, on the bank of Asque Creek.
6. 1807 — T. R. Hawley subdivides the area south of the Granger tract into 100-acre lots; Christopher Randall, Thomas Johnson and James Mace settle soon after.
7. April 22, 1809 — Nicholas Miller of Jefferson marries Sally, daughter of Christopher Randall, the first marriage in the township.
8. October 12, 1810 — A baby girl is born to Lisle Asque and his wife, the first child of the settlement; she later marries Reuben Morrison of Jefferson.
9. June 1811 — Erastus N. House and Levi French of Sandisfield, Massachusetts, settle on the Rockwell tract; House builds the first house there that fall and marries Sybil Crowell of Rome on March 24, 1812.
10. August 23, 1812 — Rev. Jacob Young preaches the first sermon, at Asque's house, the Sunday after news of Hull's surrender of Detroit.
11. 1813 — The township's name is changed from Millerstown to Lenox.
12. July 31, 1818 — Sybil House dies, the first death; a log school-house is built that year and Asaneth Waters teaches the first term.
13. December 13, 1819 — The Ashtabula commissioners organize the township; the first election, delayed to January 17, 1820, chooses Benjamin Waters, Comfort Gunn and Erastus Fowler as trustees and Levi French as clerk.
14. 1819 — Ira French builds the first sawmill and N. A. Atkins a small grist mill.
15. June 8, 1825 — Col. House receives the first postmaster's commission for Lenox.
16. 1835 — Wing & Carpenter of New York open the first store; in 1837 James Ray turns his dwelling into a tavern.
17. 1841 — Abiather Fowler starts a cheese factory, by 1845 taking the milk of five hundred cows.
18. 1861 — Prof. H. M. King organizes the King Cornet Band, which goes to the Civil War as a brigade band and is held at Columbus as a post band.
19. July 30, 1974 — The Col. Erastus House house at State Route 46 and Richmond-Footville Road is listed on the National Register of Historic Places; the Greek Revival house dates from about 1825.
20. 2020 — The census counts 1,374 residents in the township.

Stories

Tobacco colonists from Washington, and a thirteen-day trip for flour

In 1806 and 1807, Gideon Granger, a proprietor of the township, persuaded a number of farmers and mechanics from Washington, D.C. to settle in Lenox and Jefferson by telling them tobacco would make a great industry. They found the forest, and nearly all left after a few years; only Lisle Asque stayed, arriving in the late spring of 1807 and sleeping in a bark hut until his log house stood. The following May he and James Mace went with three Jefferson men to Warren for supplies. At Austinburg they took a canoe up the Grand River to Morgan, a flat-boat farther to near Mesopotamia, and then struck out through the woods, got lost, and wandered two days without food before a house saved them. At Warren there were no supplies, and they had to go on to Poland, now in Mahoning County, load teams there, and carry the loads to their boat. They were gone thirteen days. In the historian's day, he noted, the trip took half that many hours.

The King Cornet Band goes to war

Lenox was proud of its King Cornet Band, organized in 1861 by Prof. H. M. King. It enlisted under Captain W. R. Allen as a brigade band in General Lane's division and left for Kansas, only to be turned back at Chicago by an order from the secretary of war. Part of the band then trained at Governors Island and returned home in 1863. In the fall of 1864 the members enlisted as private soldiers in Captain S. H. Cook's company of the 50th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, but General Heintzelman held them at Columbus as a post band, and they stayed at Todd Barracks until the war ended. In 1878 the band numbered sixteen players, but only two of the originals, Professor King and Captain Cook, were left.

Cheese from five hundred cows, and a hurricane

Lenox was dairy country, and the factory system began in 1841, when Abiather Fowler took in the milk of a few neighbors' cows and in four years had five hundred cows contributing before a drought closed him out in 1845. John Chapin opened another factory in 1861 that made about sixteen tons a year until 1876, William De Witt started a third in 1863, and the factory T. B. Wire established in 1870 took in 3,092,053 pounds of milk in 1876 and made 300,915 pounds of cheese, which sold for $29,417.17. The township also had a hurricane on June 21, 1823 (the 1924 history says June 1821) that uprooted the forest on a strip some sixty rods wide and three miles long, and a first temperance society of eighty-five members in 1833.

Photographs

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

Every historic place in Ashtabula County on the full map

Mostly private wells The water here

• Aqua Ohio - Village of Jefferson97% of residentsLake Erie
• Dfc Mobile Home Park2% of residentsGroundwater wells (4 wells)
• Roaming Shores Village1% of residentsLake Erie

Museums, historical societies, gardens and zoos (1)

Shale and injection wells (2)

Spills reported since 2021 (2)

Money issues on the ballot since 2023: 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.
• Agreed Upon Procedures, 2023 to 2024, released 2025-05-20

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