Union

How Union began

Union is a city on the west side of the Stillwater River, in Montgomery and Miami counties, settled in 1806 and named Union in 1816. Daniel Rasor and David Hoover platted it in 1816, and Daniel Hoover had built the township's first mill about 1803 beside a 56-foot fall. It grew slowly as a farm village (224 residents in 1880), then rose to 3,654 residents by 1970 with Dayton's suburban expansion, and incorporated as a city in 1982. It had 6,859 residents in 2020.

Settled 1802 (settlers led by Mast and Hoover from North Carolina came to Randolph and Butler townships); 1806 per Wikipedia, platted 1816, incorporated 1982, by Platted by Daniel Rasor and David Hoover.

Where the name comes from

The settlement was named Union in 1816. The origin of the name is not recorded. Wikipedia notes that Union ironically lies west of West Union, Ohio, the Adams County seat.

Before the town

No Native village or trail within Union's bounds is documented. Drury's 1909 county history notes that Randolph Township, in which Union stands, had a mound and an Indian cemetery a short distance north of Englewood, both of which had disappeared by 1909. The city sits on the Stillwater River, a documented corridor of Shawnee and Miami travel and settlement in the 1700s, within the region ceded at the Treaty of Greenville (1795).

Timeline

1. 1802 — A party of settlers led by Mast and Hoover, many from Randolph County, North Carolina, cuts a road from Dayton and settles in Randolph and Butler townships; David Hoover enters the land at section 10 in February.
2. 1803 — Daniel Hoover builds the first mill in the township on section 10, using springs that flow together to a 56-foot fall; a gristmill, stillhouse, chair factory and sawmill are later strung along the three-quarter mile of stream down to the Stillwater.
3. 1806 — The settlement that became Union was established on the west side of the Stillwater River in what is now Montgomery and Miami counties.
4. 1812 — Martin Sheets, whose celebrated gun factory bored and rifled its own barrels, holds a government contract to furnish one hundred guns at $12 each.
5. 1816 — Union is platted by Daniel Rasor and David Hoover, and the mills at the place send flatboat cargoes of corn, flour and bacon down the Stillwater and Great Miami to New Orleans; the village has two or three hat shops, three shoemakers and two or three tanyards.
6. 1855 — A Methodist class is organized at Union, and a meeting house is built.
7. 1879 — The Krug House was built at what is now 3473 Sweet Potato Ridge Road in Union; it was later listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
8. 1880 — Union had a recorded population of 224 residents, still a small farm village.
9. 1909 — Union has about 300 inhabitants and a physician, Dr. F. W. Smith, and shares with Englewood a transportation improved by the Dayton and Northern traction line and the Delphos branch of the Cincinnati, Hamilton and Dayton Railroad.
10. 1960 — The census counts 1,072 residents, up from 370 in 1950; it grows to 3,654 in 1970 and 5,219 in 1980.
11. 1970 — Union's population reached 3,654, a 241% increase over 1960, as Dayton's postwar suburban growth reached the town.
12. 1982 — Union incorporated as a city.
13. 2020 — The census counts 6,859 residents, up from 6,419 in 2010.

Stories

From 224 people to a Dayton suburb

Union stayed a small farm village after its 1806 settlement, with 224 residents as late as 1880. After World War II its population rose about 190% in the 1950s and 241% in the 1960s, reaching 3,654 residents by 1970, and in 1982 Union incorporated as a city.

A fifty-six-foot fall and a gun factory

Union owed its start to a waterfall. Daniel Hoover bought land on section 10 of Randolph Township in 1802 and in 1803 built the township's first mill, using water from a number of very large springs that flowed together to an abrupt fall of fifty-six feet, three-quarters of a mile above the Stillwater. As Drury's 1909 county history tells it, in time a gristmill with an overshot and an undershot wheel each twenty-five feet across, a stillhouse, a chair factory and a sawmill were built one below another, and a second stream near it ran machinery for boring rifles. The gun factory founded by Martin Sheets was celebrated in its day; in 1812 he had a government contract for one hundred guns at $12 each, doing his own boring and rifling and making his own flintlocks. Cargoes of corn, flour and bacon went from Union on flatboats down the Stillwater and the Miami to New Orleans, and Randolph Township, the history adds, had perhaps more distilleries than any equal area. Daniel Rasor and David Hoover platted the town in 1816, and the settlers had come in 1802 from Randolph County, North Carolina, which gave the township its name.

Photographs

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

Every historic place in Montgomery County on the full map

Seven production wells spread across three well fields tapping the shallow (under 14 feet deep) Stillwater Buried Valley Aquifer beneath Englewood; well water is pumped to the city's Water Treatment Plant for iron/manganese filtration, fluoridation… The water here

• Englewood City41% of residentsStillwater Buried Valley Aquifer (wells)
• Union City38% of residentsGroundwater wells (4 wells)
• Montgomery County Water Services 220% of residentsGreat Miami Buried Valley Aquifer wells (recharged by Great Miami & Mad Rivers)
• Dayton Public Water System0% of residentsGreat Miami Buried Valley Aquifer wells (recharged by Great Miami & Mad Rivers)

Fire and EMS stations (1)

Public schools (1)

Bridges rated poor (1)

Police stations (1)

Superfund sites (2)

Spills reported since 2021 (4)

Money issues on the ballot since 2025: 1 of 3 passed; of those asking for new or higher taxes, 0 of 2.

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 Health Indicators (the Auditor of State's 17 measures; critical / cautionary / positive): 2020 3 / 0 / 14; 2021 4 / 1 / 12; 2022 1 / 0 / 16; 2023 5 / 1 / 11; 2024 0 / 1 / 16; 2025 1 / 2 / 14.
• Financial Audit, 2025, released 2026-09-01
• Financial Audit, 2024, released 2026-02-03
• Financial Audit, 2023, released 2024-10-03

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.

Cite this page