Moulton Township, Auglaize County

How Moulton Township, Auglaize County began

Moulton Township, in the geographic center of Auglaize County, was organized December 25, 1835, under Allen County, on petition of settler Joseph Haskel; nine of its original sections were struck off in 1848 to help form the new Logan Township. Its east half had been part of the Shawnee Reservation, and the 1905 county history records that a Shawnee known as Blue Jacket lived with Peter Cornstalk's band near the center of section twenty-five. The township has no incorporated village of its own; its two named places are Moulton, a crossroads on the old St. Marys and Wapakoneta Plank Road, and Glynwood, a Lake Erie and Western Railroad station founded by Irish immigrant John Glynn, whose St. Patrick's Catholic Church is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Settled 1832-1833, incorporated 1835-12-25, by petitioned by Joseph Haskel.

Where the name comes from

No verified origin is recorded for the name 'Moulton' as applied to this township; the 1835 organizing petition, filed by settler Joseph Haskel, requested the name but does not explain it.

Before the town

The township's east half had formerly been part of the Shawnee Reservation set off around Wapakoneta, and Native improvement predated white settlement: about fifteen acres along the Auglaize River in sections twenty-five and twenty-six had already been cleared by Peter Cornstalk's band of Shawnee when the township was organized. The 1905 county history says a Shawnee known as Blue Jacket lived with Cornstalk's band there until he and the Shawnee Prophet, Tenskwatawa, moved west of the Mississippi; he cannot have been the Fallen Timbers war chief of that name, who died about 1810; the site of Blue Jacket's cabin, near the center of section twenty-five, was occupied in 1905 by John Schlenker's brick residence.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee.

• Blue Jacket's cabin site / Peter Cornstalk's band (camp) — near the center of section 25, Moulton Township, along the Auglaize River, to early 1830s (archive.org)

Timeline

1. 1832-12-26 — The first land entries in Moulton Township are made at the land office newly opened at Wapakoneta.
2. 1832-1833 — The first white settlers arrive, including Joseph Haskill, Joseph Bonson, William Julian, Daniel Cutler, Benjamin Nagle and others, on land that included the former Shawnee Reservation's east half.
3. 1835-12-25 — Moulton Township is organized under Allen County on the petition of Joseph Haskel; the first township election is set for January 30, 1836, at Haskel's house.
4. 1840 — James McFarland, born in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, buys 160 acres on the St. Marys road three and a half miles west of Wapakoneta; elected a justice of the peace soon afterward, he serves thirty-one consecutive years and as township treasurer twenty-six.
5. 1848 — Auglaize County is formed; nine sections are struck off the north part of Moulton Township to help form the new Logan Township.
6. 1850 — Thomas Cogan, who came from Sligo, Ireland, in 1847 and worked on eastern canals, buys eighty acres of canal land in the township; by 1905 he has added to it to own 216 acres.
7. 1853 — The Wapakoneta and St. Marys Plank Road, built in 1852-53 by a stock company of citizens of the two towns, runs through the township; Moulton village grows up on it midway between them.
8. 1857 — John Glynn, born in County Galway in 1820 and a Columbus resident since 1851, moves on May 15 to the farm in Moulton Township that the Lake Erie and Western Railroad later crosses.
9. 1876 — Glynwood village is laid out in March on the west line of section 20, at the intersection of the Lake Erie and Western line, and named for John Glynn.
10. 1877 — The Lake Erie and Western Railroad extends its line to Minster by way of St. Marys; Glynwood is among the villages that spring up along it.
11. 1891 — Oil is struck on Thomas Cogan's farm; by 1905 it has five oil wells and a gas well, and in the 1905 history's words the discovery of oil has yielded a substantial income to the landowners.
12. 1903 — Moulton Township has five churches (Catholic near Glynwood; Methodist Episcopal and German Lutheran at Moulton; Christian at Oak Grove; United Brethren on the Auglaize), nine brick district schools and a population described as mostly Irish and German in descent.
13. 1979-07-26 — St. Patrick's Catholic Church in Glynwood is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
14. 2020 — The census counts 1,634 people in Moulton Township.

Stories

A Shawnee cabin under a Moulton farmhouse

When Moulton Township was organized in 1835, most of it was still dense wilderness, but about fifteen acres along the Auglaize River in sections twenty-five and twenty-six had already been cleared, the work of Peter Cornstalk's band of Shawnee living on land that was then part of the Wapakoneta reservation. The 1905 county history says a Shawnee known as Blue Jacket lived among them near the center of section twenty-five until he and the Shawnee Prophet moved west across the Mississippi. By 1905, when that history was written, the exact spot of Blue Jacket's cabin was occupied by John Schlenker's brick farmhouse, one family's ordinary home built over ground that had once held a Shawnee cabin.

A farm on the railroad becomes Glynwood

John Glynn was born in Galway County, Ireland, in 1820 and emigrated in 1851, settling first in Columbus before buying a farm in Auglaize County in 1857. When the Lake Erie and Western Railroad was routed straight through his land, Glynn laid out a town on the right of way; his neighbor Samuel Craig named the new station Glynwood in his honor. The village never grew past a country depot, a store, a post office, a shoe shop and a saw-mill, but its Catholic church, St. Patrick's, still stands and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The justice and the bishop

James McFarland was born at Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, in 1814 and came with his parents to Logan County in 1835; five years later he bought 160 acres in Moulton Township on the St. Marys road, west of Wapakoneta. Soon after settling he was elected justice of the peace, an office he held for thirty-one consecutive years, and for twenty-six he was also township treasurer. He married four times. His next younger brother was Francis P. McFarland, who became Bishop of the Hartford diocese in Connecticut, and another brother, Josiah, was a doctor in Cleveland. The farm on the St. Marys road was his home until his death.

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

Every historic place in Auglaize County on the full map

Reported bedrock limestone (carbonate) aquifer wells (7 deep) and a sand-and-gravel aquifer (2 shallow wells) The water here

• Wapakoneta City84% of residentsTeays River Buried Valley Aquifer (wells)
• St. Marys City16% of residentsTeays River Buried Valley Aquifer (wells)
• Lakeside Estates Mobile Home Park0% of residentsGroundwater wells (1 wells)

Spills reported since 2021 (1)

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.

Auditor of State record

• No fiscal caution, watch or emergency on the Auditor of State's lists.
• Agreed Upon Procedures, 2023 to 2024, released 2025-10-09

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