Tontogany

How Tontogany began

Tontogany, platted in 1855 and incorporated in 1874, takes its name from Tondaganie -- written today as Tontogany, Ottawa for 'dog' -- an Ottawa chief who adopted a settler named Peter Minor as his son and secured him a land grant near Providence under the 1817 Treaty of the Maumee Rapids. The village sits on Tontogany Creek in Washington Township.

Settled fall 1830 (Samuel Hamilton, with William North), platted May 5, 1855 (surveyed by Sylvanus Jefferson for Willard V. Way and E. D. Peck, who named it for the Indian chief), incorporated September 9, 1874 (on a petition of 42 residents presented April 17 and June 2, 1874), by Willard V. Way and E. D. Peck (plat).

Where the name comes from

Tontogany is named for Tondaganie -- an Ottawa chief whose name, now written Tontogany, meant 'dog' in the Ottawa language, per the county's own 1897 history. Tondaganie adopted a white settler, Peter Minor (whose Ottawa name was Sawendebans, 'yellow hair'), as his son; at the 1817 Treaty of the Maumee Rapids, the Ottawa requested and received a land grant for Minor out of their own reservation near Providence. The creek and later the village took the chief's name.

Before the town

Tontogany's name preserves a Native story recorded in the 1897 Wood County history. Tondaganie -- 'Tontogany' in its modern spelling, meaning 'dog' in the Ottawa language -- was an Ottawa chief at the time of the September 1817 Treaty of the Maumee Rapids, the council at which Duncan McArthur and Lewis Cass, for the United States, purchased the remaining Native lands in Ohio from about 7,000 Wyandot, Ottawa, Chippewa (Ojibwe), Potawatomi, Seneca, Delaware (Lenape) and Shawnee people gathered at the rapids. Tondaganie had adopted a white settler, Peter Minor -- given the Ottawa name Sawendebans, or 'yellow hair' -- as his son, and at the Ottawa's request the 1817 treaty gave Minor a section of land out of a former Ottawa reservation near Providence (in what is now Lucas County).

Nations recorded here: Ottawa.

• Tontogany Creek (other) — Washington Township, running through the village of Tontogany, named for Ottawa chief Tondaganie (Tontogany), active 1817 (archive.org)

Timeline

1. 1817-09 — At the Treaty of the Maumee Rapids, the Ottawa request and receive a personal land grant for Peter Minor, adopted son of Chief Tondaganie (Tontogany), out of their own reservation near Providence.
2. 1830 — Samuel Hamilton of New York selects the village site in the fall, and William North builds a cabin with his parents near where the fair grounds later stood.
3. 1855 — The village of Tontogany, on Tontogany Creek in Washington Township, is platted.
4. 1857 — A post office opens at Tontogany.
5. 1859 — The Cincinnati, Hamilton & Dayton Railroad is completed to Tontogany on June 17 and the last rail is laid on August 18, when the first train runs from Cincinnati to Toledo.
6. 1861 — The Methodist Episcopal church receives its lot on May 18 and builds that year; the First Presbyterian church is organized on September 4.
7. 1862 — Tontogany has a hotel kept by A. C. B. Drury, two grain houses with a capacity of 50,000 bushels, two churches, a sawmill and four or five stores.
8. 1874 — Tontogany is incorporated as a village.
9. 1875 — The first village election is held on April 11, with J. Patchen elected mayor.
10. 1876 — A fire on December 31 destroys the drug store of Black & Ingraham, William Allen's store, George Reed's store and the Masonic hall above it, a grocery and a tailor shop; the block is rebuilt within a few years.
11. 1893 — The Tontogany grist-mill burns; steel grain tanks are built at the elevator in 1895.
12. 1900 — The population is 352, up from 283 in 1890 and 343 in 1880.
13. 1970 — The population is 395, its highest count; the 2020 census counts 387.
14. 2016 — A CSX train derailment involving six cars causes significant damage to downtown Tontogany, later leading to reimbursement for road repairs.

Stories

The chief, his adopted son, and the creek that kept his name

In September 1817, at the treaty council held at the Maumee Rapids, an Ottawa chief named Tondaganie -- whose name meant simply 'dog' in the Ottawa language -- asked federal commissioners Duncan McArthur and Lewis Cass for something unusual: a personal land grant, carved out of his own people's reservation near Providence, for a white man named Peter Minor. Minor was not a stranger to the Ottawa; he had been adopted as Tondaganie's own son and carried the Ottawa name Sawendebans, 'yellow hair.' The request was granted, one small, human transaction folded into a treaty that otherwise transferred roughly the last seven thousand Native people's remaining claim to Ohio soil to the United States. Decades later, when settlers platted a village on the creek that had long carried the old chief's name -- rendered by then as Tontogany -- they kept it, so that a town built well after the Ottawa had been pushed out of Ohio still carries, in its own name, the memory of a chief's adopted son.

The Slippery Elm Road

The Cincinnati, Hamilton & Dayton Railroad was completed to Tontogany on June 17, 1859, and the last rail was laid by Superintendent R. M. Shoemaker on August 18, when the first train from Cincinnati ran through to Toledo. The railroad gave the village an impulse: by 1862 it had a hotel, two grain houses holding 50,000 bushels, two churches and a sawmill. After the Civil War the people of Bowling Green talked of a branch line to connect with the C.H.&D., and in May 1874 David Donaldson surveyed a route; when the branch was built the railroaders at Tontogany nicknamed it, in April 1875, 'The Slippery Elm Road'. The village incorporated in 1874 and held its first election on April 11, 1875, electing J. Patchen mayor. A Union ticket nominated in 1895 won the elections of 1896: women, who could vote for school officers, cast 22 votes in a count of 54 votes for mayor. On New Year's Eve of 1876, a fire swept a row of stores and the Masonic hall.

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

Maumee River, pumped from a riverside intake on Ohio 65 into the 170-million-gallon Bowling Green Reservoir for storage before treatment The water here

• Tontogany Village100% of residentsMaumee River (via Bowling Green Reservoir)

Fire and EMS stations (1)

Public schools (3)

Spills reported since 2021 (1)

Auditor of State record

• No fiscal caution, watch or emergency on the Auditor of State's lists.
• Agreed Upon Procedures, 2024 to 2025, released 2026-06-09
• Financial Audit, 2022 to 2023, released 2024-11-14

Statewide question: State Issue 3: Voter ID

Local questions for Tontogany, Wood County and its school district:

• Wood County: Renews a 1-mill property tax levy for the provide & maintain senior citizens services or facilities of Wood County for 5 years, beginning in 2026.

Races, candidates and every question for an address: your ballot. County offices and judges are on your county board's sample ballot.

Source: Ohio EPA eDocument portal (edocpub.epa.ohio.gov), indexed 2026-10-14. Facilities are placed on the map from Ohio EPA's own map layers, EPA's Facility Registry, coordinates written in the filings, or a geocoded street address. A permit filed under a private person's name (most are household septic systems) is counted but never named, placed or linked; licenses for individual workers and open-burning notices are left out entirely.

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