Loramie Township, Shelby County

How Loramie Township, Shelby County began

Loramie Township, in the southwest corner of Shelby County, existed by 1822, when Cynthian Township was detached from it. It was settled from about 1812, with Robert and David Houston and others arriving in 1814 and 1815, and from the late 1830s French families settled its western part, so that the 1913 county history calls the township distinctive in its citizenship and customs. Its villages are Russia in the west and the small communities of Houston, North Houston, Dawson and Mount Jefferson. Despite the shared name, the village of Fort Loramie lies in neighboring McLean Township. The township is crossed by the Big Four Railroad with three stations.

Settled 1812, incorporated by 1822, by early settlers including Samuel McClure (before the War of 1812) and Robert, David and John Houston (1814-1815).

Where the name comes from

The township's name honors Pierre-Louis (Peter) de Lorimier, the 18th-century French-Canadian fur trader whose trading post on Loramie Creek gave the creek, the later fort, and eventually the village of Fort Loramie their name; the township took the same name even though the fort site and village ended up across the line in McLean Township.

Before the town

Loramie Township sits along Loramie Creek, the same waterway on which Peter Loramie's fur-trading post stood a few miles away (in what became McLean Township); the creek and the wider area were used by the Shawnee, who staged Revolutionary War-era raids from the post before it was destroyed in 1782. No mounds, earthworks, or named villages specific to Loramie Township's own ground (Russia, Houston, Dawson, Mount Jefferson, Massena) were found in the sources consulted. The county's wider Native American and treaty history includes the Fort Loramie trading post and the Treaty of Greenville line.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee, Miami.

Timeline

1. 1812 — Samuel McClure settles in the township area before the War of 1812.
2. 1814 — Robert and David Houston settle in the township, followed by William and John Houston in 1815.
3. 1815 — William Morrow comes from Cumberland, Pennsylvania, with his wife and six children and settles on section 27; William Johnston and John Patterson follow in 1816 and William Skillen of Westmoreland County in 1817, with Zebediah Richardson, William Anderson and Thomas Wyatt shortly before.
4. 1818 — Henry Zemer settles in section 6 and Jacob Black in section 13; by 1820 Jacob Everly, David Clark, Henry Harp and Robert Johnston are in the township.
5. 1822 — Cynthian Township is detached from Loramie Township, which therefore already exists by this year.
6. 1825 — On March 7 the township trustees issue the first recorded orders, ten of them totaling $10.25 for 1824, paying a dollar or two each to supervisors, trustees and the clerk, Snow Richardson; the treasurer reports no money received and none spent. The trustees lay out road districts that year and the township is divided into three in 1826.
7. 1828 — In March the township is divided into two school districts, with twelve householders in the first and thirty-three in the second; on December 27 sections 27, 28, 21 and 22 are attached to school district No. 2 of Grayson (Washington) Township on petition.
8. 1835 — French settlers begin to arrive in the western part of the township: James Unum in 1835, J. J. Debrosse and Joseph Gaible in 1837, John B. Malliott and Amos Peppiot in 1838, Tebone Didier in 1840, Henry Delaet in 1844, Simon Richards in 1845, Louis Peltier in 1848 and Nicholas Didier in 1852.
9. 1837 — Fort Loramie village is surveyed nearby on December 2 -- but the site falls within McLean, not Loramie, Township.
10. 1848 — The Loramie German Baptist Church is organized within the township; members meet in private homes until a church building is erected in 1866.
11. 1883 — Loramie Township is crossed from the northeast corner to the center of the west line by the Cincinnati, Columbus, Cleveland and Indianapolis railroad, with two stations; its villages are Houston, North Houston, Mount Jefferson and Russia, and the county historian calls the settlement old and the community wealthy.
12. 1913 — Three Big Four Railroad stations, Dawson, North Houston and Russia, serve the township, whose western part has been settled largely by the French; the old canal cuts through its northeast corner.
13. 2020 — The census counts 2,650 people in Loramie Township.

Stories

A township that lost its namesake village

Loramie Township takes its name from Peter Loramie's fur-trading post on Loramie Creek, but the village that eventually carried the Loramie name -- Fort Loramie -- was surveyed in 1837 on ground that fell inside McLean Township, organized a few years earlier in 1834. Loramie Township kept the name and the creek, but its own trade centers grew up elsewhere: Russia in the west, and Houston, Dawson, Mount Jefferson, and Massena along the Big Four Railroad. The mismatch between a township's name and its namesake village's actual location is easy to miss on a modern map and is a recurring trap in this county's records.

A township budget of $10.25

The 1913 county history reprints the Loramie Township records to show what a township government cost in the 1820s. The orders issued and granted for 1824 numbered twenty-three to twenty-nine and came to $10.25 in all: a dollar each to Jacob R. Harp and William Johnston as supervisors, a dollar and seventy-five cents to Jonas Richardson, a dollar and fifty cents each to trustees Samuel McClure, Robert McClure and John Booker, and two dollars to clerk Snow Richardson, all dated March 7, 1825. The treasurer reported that no money had been received and none expended. In 1826 the orders totaled $7.75, and the next year just over five dollars. The history prints the list, it says, to show the names of people who played a part in the affairs of the time and the difference in volume of business transacted by township officers then and now.

The French in the west of Loramie

The western part of Loramie Township was settled in the late 1830s by people from France, which the 1883 county history says still preserved its identity especially in its church and schools. James Unum came in 1835, J. J. Debrosse and Joseph Gaible in 1837, John B. Malliott and Amos Peppiot in 1838, Tebone Didier in 1840, Henry Delaet in 1844, Simon Richards of France in 1845, Louis Peltier in 1848 and Nicholas Didier in 1852. They settled among neighbors who had come earlier, such as the Houston and Morrow families from Pennsylvania and Christian Mader from Germany in 1834, and the 1913 history calls the township 'more or less distinguished from the other townships in its citizenship and its customs.'

Local history sources: ohiogenealogyexpress.com · ohiogenealogyexpress.com · en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org · archive.org · archive.org

Mostly private wells The water here

• Russia Village100% of residentsGroundwater wells (3 wells)

Fire and EMS stations (1)

Public schools (2)

Spills reported since 2021 (3)

Money issues on the ballot since 2023: 3 of 3 passed; of those asking for new or higher taxes, 1 of 1.

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 2025-12-30

Cite this page