Washington Township, Miami County

How Washington Township, Miami County began

Washington Township was organized in 1814 on the west side of the Great Miami River in the northern part of Miami County; the Beers 1880 county history called it the smallest in area but the wealthiest and most populous of the county's townships, a status owed chiefly to its long river frontage and proximity to the city of Piqua, which was carved out of the township's territory as it grew.

Incorporated 1814.

Where the name comes from

The township is one of forty-three in Ohio named Washington, in all likelihood for George Washington; the county history gives no local reason for the choice.

Before the town

The land that became Washington Township lay immediately around Upper Piqua, the Shawnee town and later headquarters on the Great Miami River, before the Shawnee relocated to Wapakoneta in the treaty era. Fort Piqua, which the 1880 county history describes as long a British post, stood near the Shawnee settlement and served as a supply depot for American armies during the Indian wars of the 1790s. Col. John Johnston, who lived at Upper Piqua, served for years as the U.S. Indian agent for the Shawnee and other tribes in the region. These events center on the Piqua settlement itself (now the incorporated city, outside the present unincorporated township) rather than on farmland that remains part of Washington Township today; treat this as township-adjacent context. For county-wide treaty and removal history.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee.

• Fort Piqua (other) — Upper Piqua, on the Great Miami River near present-day Piqua, 1790s (built near an existing Shawnee settlement) (thetroyhistoricalsociety.org)

Timeline

1. 1798 — Joseph Gard, who had come with General Anthony Wayne's army, settles at "Piqua Bend" on the Great Miami River, the start of European settlement in the area that became Washington Township and, later, the city of Piqua.
2. c. 1799 — John Manning buys Joe Gard's improvement at Piqua Bend; about 1804 he starts a mill, described as the first in the area.
3. 1807 — Armstrong Brandon begins laying out the town plat of Piqua on June 29; the village that year has seven log houses.
4. 1809 — The first schoolhouse in Piqua is built, with Isaac Hendershott as teacher.
5. 1814 — Washington Township is organized with its present boundaries.
6. 1816 — United Presbyterians build the area's first church.
7. 1818 — A brick seminary is built on the public square at Piqua.
8. 1823 — The village is incorporated as Washington and the name is changed to Piqua by an act of the legislature.
9. 1824 — At Piqua, John McCorkle starts a water-powered linseed oil mill.
10. 1825 — Methodists build a brick church on Spring Street in Piqua, and St. James Episcopal Parish, organized about 1820, builds its church.
11. 1830 — Old School Presbyterians and Baptists each build their first churches in Piqua.
12. 1837 — The Miami and Erie Canal reaches Piqua, transforming it into a major trade center for northwestern Ohio and eastern Indiana.
13. 1850 — Piqua becomes a city of the second class, taking in most of the settled part of the township.

Stories

The smallest township, and the richest

According to the Beers 1880 History of Miami County, Washington was "the smallest in size, though the wealthiest and most populous" of the county's twelve townships. Its wealth came from the Great Miami River, which runs its full length on the east side, and from its position wrapped around Piqua, which grew from Joseph Gard's 1798 cabin at "Piqua Bend" into a canal town after 1837 and eventually incorporated away from the township that had contained it. What is left of Washington Township today is the unincorporated farmland around that city — a pattern common across Ohio, where a township's most historic ground ends up inside a city with its own separate history and its own separate National Register list.

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

Piqua draws surface water from the Great Miami River and its historic hydraulic-canal lakes, supplemented by a gravel-pit reservoir, per federal intake records The water here

• Piqua City98% of residentsGreat Miami River + Ernst Gravel Pit + Swift Run Lake (hydraulic system)
• Covington Village2% of residentsGroundwater wells (6 wells)
• Country Meadows Condo.0% of residentsGroundwater wells (1 wells)

Private schools (1)

Facilities reporting toxic releases (1)

Spills reported since 2021 (3)

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, 2024 to 2025, released 2026-07-28

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