Madison Township, Pickaway County

How Madison Township, Pickaway County began

Madison Township, the smallest in Pickaway County by area and in the extreme northeastern corner of the county, was established by the county commissioners on June 5, 1810, with the first township election ordered for later that month at the home of settler Luke Decker, who found a camp of Native people near his own new home when he arrived and who later served as a War of 1812 commissary to Gen. William Henry Harrison. The township never grew a real town beyond St. Paul, a crossroads settlement that never held more than about 70 residents, yet St. Paul supported a high school as early as 1883, four or five years ahead of any other township in the county. Two farms here, the Fridley-Oman Farm, preserved today as the Slate Run Living Historical Farm inside Slate Run Metro Park, and the Perrill-Goodman Farmhouse, are separately listed on the National Register of Historic Places; several other National Register buildings near Groveport that share a ZIP code with this township actually stand across the county line in Madison Township, Franklin County, and belong there rather than here.

Settled about 1804-1805 (George Reed, George Gibson, Col. Thomas Gibson, John Ritter and Henry Hall), incorporated June 5, 1810, by the Pickaway County Commissioners, by the Pickaway County Commissioners.

Where the name comes from

No source consulted explains why the township was named Madison. Its organization in June 1810 came less than a year and a half into President James Madison's first term, a period in which many new Ohio townships and counties took his name, but no source we found states that connection specifically for this township.

Before the town

The 1906 county history records that, 'until recent years,' small mounds attributed to the Mound Builders could be seen in various parts of Madison Township, though it gives no location, size, or culture more specific than that generic label, and no excavation is recorded. The same source adds that the township 'seems also to have been a favorite resort with the Indians,' citing stone hammers, spear and arrowheads, and pestles for pounding corn found across the township, again without naming a specific nation or period. One concrete incident survives: when Luke Decker settled in the township around 1810 or 1811, there was, in the history's words, 'a camp of Indians near his place who went away soon after his settlement,' though no nation, size, or further detail about this camp is given. No source consulted names a specific village, trail, or treaty event within Madison Township's own boundaries. The documented Shawnee towns of the 1770s lay well to the south on the Pickaway Plains, covered in the Pickaway Township file; no county-level file yet exists for Pickaway County to point to for the wider Native history of the area.

• Unlocated mounds (mound) — various parts of Madison Township (no specific location recorded), unspecified; attributed generically to the Mound Builders (archive.org)

Timeline

1. 1804-1805 — George Reed, George Gibson, Col. Thomas Gibson, John Ritter (the township's first blacksmith) and Henry Hall settle among the earliest recorded residents of the township.
2. 1810 — Madison Township is established by the county commissioners on June 5; the first township election is ordered for June 23 at the home of Luke Decker.
3. 1810 or 1811 — Luke Decker settles in the township; a camp of Native people located near his place moves on soon afterward. Decker later serves as a commissary to Gen. William Henry Harrison during the War of 1812.
4. 1816 or 1817 — Luke Decker builds the township's first grist-mill, which operates for more than 25 years.
5. 1834 — St. Paul's Evangelical Lutheran Church holds its first service on June 29 at the house of Mrs. Mary Magdalene Hoover and formally organizes on August 3.
6. 1856 — Trinity Lutheran Church organizes, with a frame church built in the southeastern corner of section 25 on land given by Jacob Brobst.
7. 1866 — G. A. Knepper and John R. Teegardin build a store and open the township's only real commercial settlement, St. Paul, at what was previously called Teegardin's.
8. 1883 — The Madison Township High School is established at St. Paul, four or five years before any other township in the county takes similar action; it later moves to the center of the township.
9. 1896 — The Madison Presbyterian Church is organized, with its building dedicated on December 13.
10. 1902 — The post office at St. Paul, established around 1859 or 1860, is discontinued; residents afterward receive mail by rural free delivery from Ashville.
11. 1975 — The Fridley-Oman Farm, in what is now Slate Run Metropolitan Park, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places on December 6.
12. 1985 — The Perrill-Goodman Farmhouse, on Goodman Road south of Groveport, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places on March 14.

Stories

An Indian Camp Near Luke Decker's Place

When Luke Decker brought his new bride, Ivea Fox, from Virginia to begin a home in Madison Township around 1810 or 1811, he was not the only one camped on the land: the 1906 county history records simply that there was 'a camp of Indians near his place who went away soon after his settlement.' No name, nation, or further detail about this camp survives in the record, only the bare fact of its presence and its quiet departure. Decker went on to serve as a commissary to Gen. William Henry Harrison during the War of 1812, built the township's first grist-mill in 1816 or 1817, and later gave each of his children 160 acres of land; his family became, in the words of the same history, 'among the best-known residents of Madison and Harrison townships.' The unnamed camp that briefly shared his land before moving on left no other trace.

A Head Start on High School

St. Paul was never much of a town, a crossroads settlement of perhaps 70 people at its largest, but its school board moved faster than any other in Pickaway County. In 1883, Madison Township established a township high school there, four or five years before similar action was taken anywhere else in the county, thanks to board members George A. Kuepper, Monroe Brobst and W. T. Conklin. The school moved from St. Paul to a two-room brick building at the center of the township and, over 23 years, graduated about 75 students, many of whom went on to become teachers themselves, a disproportionate return from one of the smallest and least populous townships in the county.

Photographs

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

Every historic place in Pickaway County on the full map

Mostly private wells The water here

• Ashville Village61% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Columbus Public Water System18% of residentsScioto River (Griggs & O'Shaughnessy), Hoover Reservoir on Big Walnut Ck, plus wells
• South Bloomfield Village16% of residentsGroundwater wells (3 wells)
• Groveport4% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Obetz Satellite 21% of residentsScioto River (Griggs & O'Shaughnessy), Hoover Reservoir on Big Walnut Ck, plus wells
• Obetz Village1% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Commercial Point Village0% of residentsGroundwater wells (6 wells)

Bridges rated poor (1)

Museums, historical societies, gardens and zoos (2)

Public EV charging (1)

Shale and injection wells (1)

Spills reported since 2021 (3)

Money issues on the ballot since 2022: 1 of 1 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 2026-03-03

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