Perry Township, Lake County

How Perry Township, Lake County began

Perry Township was one of four Lake County townships the Connecticut Land Company set aside from the Western Reserve, first settled in 1808 by Ezra Beebe near the Grand River, and formally organized July 1, 1815, with a name honoring Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry's 1813 victory at the Battle of Lake Erie. Nineteenth-century industry ran to iron foundries, lumber and grain mills and cheese factories on the strength of Lake Erie's moderating climate and well-drained soil; the township's most famous native son, fifer Hugh Mosher, was the model for the fifer in the painting Spirit of '76. Since the 1970s the township has instead been defined by the Perry Nuclear Generating Station on its Lake Erie shore.

Settled 1808 (Ezra Beebe, first probable settler, near the Grand River), incorporated July 1, 1815 (township organized), by Ezra Beebe.

Where the name comes from

The township is named for Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry, whose victory over the British fleet at the Battle of Lake Erie in September 1813 was a turning point of the War of 1812 in the western theater.

Before the town

No Native American village, trail or site specific to Perry Township proper is documented in the sources consulted; the county's one well-documented prehistoric earthwork, Indian Point, sometimes recorded under the alternate name 'Painesville Fort' and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974 with an Erie/Whittlesey cultural affiliation, lies to the west in neighboring LeRoy Township rather than within Perry Township itself, despite sharing a ZIP code with parts of Perry.

Timeline

1. 1808 — Ezra Beebe becomes the township's first probable settler, taking land near the Grand River; he dies in spring 1813, the township's first recorded adult death.
2. 1810-1812 — Additional families -- Simonds, Hanks, Bates, Allen and Ellis among them -- buy land and settle in the township.
3. 1815 — Perry Township formally organizes on July 1; the first school term is taught that summer in a log cabin on South Ridge Road (State Route 84).
4. 1819 — Hugh Mosher is born in Perry Township; he later becomes the model for the fifer in Archibald Willard's famous painting Spirit of '76.
5. 1974 — Construction begins on the Perry Nuclear Generating Station on the township's Lake Erie shore, on October 1.
6. 1987 — Perry Nuclear Generating Station reaches full operational status on November 18.
7. 1993 — The plant's 1,100-acre site is designated an urban wildlife sanctuary.

Stories

The fifer who became a national image

Hugh Mosher, born in Perry Township in 1819, could not have known as a boy that his face would end up better known to Americans than almost anyone else's from Lake County. As an old man, Mosher served as the model for the drummer-and-fifer trio in Archibald Willard's painting The Spirit of '76 (also known as Yankee Doodle), the Revolutionary War image -- three ragged patriot musicians marching forward under fire -- that became one of the most reproduced pieces of American patriotic art, familiar from postage stamps, currency proposals and a thousand Fourth of July decorations. Mosher's own life ran the ordinary course of a nineteenth-century Perry Township farmer; it was only in old age, sitting for Willard's brush, that he became, unwittingly, one of the most recognized faces in the country.

Local history sources: perrytownship-lake.com · en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org · painesville.com

Lake Erie, drawn through a 48-inch pipe extending about 4,000 feet offshore from the Painesville Township plant The water here

• Lake County East Water Subdistrict84% of residentsLake Erie
• Painesville City11% of residentsLake Erie
• Aqua Ohio - Mentor3% of residentsLake Erie
• Fairport Harbor Village1% of residentsLake Erie
• Ashtabula County Water System1% of residentsLake Erie

Fire and EMS stations (1)

Superfund sites (1)

Facilities reporting toxic releases (2)

Spills reported since 2021 (1)

Who holds office

Roster as of 2026-01-23: county board of elections.

Money issues on the ballot since 2021: 1 of 2 passed; of those asking for new or higher taxes, 0 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 2025-05-27

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