Orange Township, Ashland County

How Orange Township, Ashland County began

Orange Township was surveyed in 1807 by Maxfield Ludlow and first settled in the spring of 1814 by Vachel Metcalf and Amos Norris, followed within months by the Young, Crouse, Mason and Bishop families. Martin Mason began building the township's first gristmill in the fall of 1815, and it was grinding sixty bushels a day by March 1816 -- an early sign of a farming community taking root. The village of Orange was platted on April 22, 1828 and had grown to roughly 200 residents by 1860; today the township's center of gravity is the unincorporated community of Nankin in its south end, home to a fire station and post office. An 1880 county history records a striking archaeological find near the village of Orange: a mound yielding red and yellow ochre, charcoal, shell and a seven-inch pure copper needle, plus skeletal remains reported at nearly seven feet, which the same source speculated belonged to 'a people in advance of the Indian.'

Settled 1814, platted 1828 (village of Orange), by Vachel Metcalf and Amos Norris.

Where the name comes from

Not documented in the sources consulted; Orange is one of six townships of that name in Ohio, and no source found gives a specific derivation for this one.

Before the town

The Norris mound, on section 28 near the village of Orange, is the best-documented prehistoric site tied to this township: an 1880 excavation account describes human bone, large quantities of red and yellow ochre, charcoal, a few shells and a pure copper native-copper needle seven inches long, plus reports of unusually large skeletal remains. The copper needle and ochre point to Adena or Hopewell mound-building tradition rather than to the historic Delaware, Wyandot or Shawnee, though the 1880 source does not assign a culture by name. No named historic-era village, trail or treaty line specific to Orange Township was found. The Greenville Treaty line ran along the county's south edge, and Delaware and Wyandot people were present across Ashland County.

Nations recorded here: Adena culture, Hopewell culture.

• Norris mound (mound) — section 28, near the village of Orange, Orange Township, prehistoric, likely Adena or Hopewell (copper needle, ochre) (archive.org)

Timeline

1. 1807 — Orange Township is surveyed by Maxfield Ludlow.
2. 1814 — Vachel Metcalf and Amos Norris become the township's first settlers in the spring; Jacob Young, Jacob Crouse, Martin and Jacob Mason, and John Bishop follow within the year.
3. 1815 — Martin Mason begins building the township's first gristmill in the fall.
4. 1816 — Mason's mill is operating by March, capable of grinding sixty bushels of grain a day.
5. 1828 — The village of Orange is platted on April 22.
6. 1846 — Orange Township becomes part of the newly formed Ashland County on February 24.
7. 1860 — The village of Orange has grown to roughly 200 residents.

Stories

A copper needle and a mystery of scale

Sometime before 1880, diggers opened a mound near the village of Orange, on section 28, and found human bone mixed with large quantities of red and yellow ochre, charcoal, a few shells, and a pure copper needle seven inches long -- a level of craft and long-distance trade (native copper of this kind typically traveled from the Lake Superior region) that told the county historian this find predated the historic Delaware. Reports also circulated of skeletal remains measuring nearly seven feet, feeding contemporary speculation about a lost race of giants that was common in nineteenth-century mound accounts across the Midwest. Read plainly, the mound is best understood as an Adena or Hopewell burial site whose builders were separated from the historic tribes of 1700s Ohio by well over a thousand years.

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

Mostly private wells The water here

• Ashland City83% of residentsJerome Fork Basin sand-and-gravel aquifer (wells)
• Rural Lorain Co. Water A15% of residentsMostly Lake Erie (bought from Avon Lake); some New London Reservoir and Ashland wells
• Bailey Lakes Village2% of residentsLake Erie
• Hayesville Village1% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)

Fire and EMS stations (1)

Public schools (4)

Spills reported since 2021 (1)

Money issues on the ballot since 2022: 4 of 4 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.
• Financial Audit, 2023 to 2024, released 2026-07-09

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