Waterville Township, Lucas County

How Waterville Township, Lucas County began

Waterville Township, on the north bank of the Maumee above the Rapids, is four years older than Lucas County: the Wood County commissioners set it off from Waynesfield Township early in 1831 and its first election was held April 4, 1831. Its first settler, Isaac Richardson, built a cabin on the later Roche de Boeuf Farm in 1814 and opened the area's first tavern there in 1816; John Pray, who came in 1817-18, built a mill on Granger Island in 1821 and platted Waterville in 1830 (Waggoner elsewhere gives 1831 and 1832), and the Wabash Railroad produced the village of Whitehouse in the northwest of the township in the 1850s and 1860s. Stone was its industry: the Miami and Erie Canal opened the first quarry in 1838, and by 1888 the Whitehouse quarries were ballasting the Wabash as far west as the Mississippi; a gas well struck in 1887 put the township on the northwestern Ohio gas belt. The township had 1,968 residents in 1920 and 7,036 at the 2020 census.

Settled 1814 (Isaac Richardson, on the later Roche de Boeuf Farm), incorporated set off from Waynesfield Township by the Wood County commissioners early in 1831; first election April 4, 1831, by first trustees James C. Adams, Jonas Cleveland and William Meeker.

Where the name comes from

The township takes its name from the city of Waterville at its southeastern edge, itself named for its position on the Maumee River.

Before the town

Waggoner (1888) calls the river here a favorite hunting and fishing ground and records that arrowheads and stone hatchets were still turning up in the fields. About a mile from Waterville, on the Roche de Boeuf Farm (southwest of the village in Waggoner, above it in Killits), stood a burial mound that Ottawa tradition, as told by the scout Peter Manor to Henry Howe, held to contain nearly 200 people killed in a chain of revenge killings that began when a child fell from the Roche de Boeuf; it was first opened in 1833, relic hunters carried off bones and implements, and by 1923 the plow had leveled it. The main road through the township began as the trail used by Native people from the Wapakoneta hunting grounds to the British post at Fort Malden for their annual payments, and Lucina Haskins, an early Waterville resident, remembered it crowded with travelers; the village of Whitehouse's own history similarly describes Native travel along what is now Weckerly Road between Fort Malden and Kentucky. General Anthony Wayne built Fort Deposit near the Roche de Boeuf, completed August 18, 1794, and marched from it to the battle of Fallen Timbers two days later. The 1807 Treaty of Detroit reserved a six-mile-square tract for the village of the Odawa (Ottawa) chief Tondaganie (the Dog) just above Waterville, and Wikipedia records the Nawash-Kinjoano Reservation along the north bank from 1807 to 1831.

Nations recorded here: Odawa (Ottawa), Miami, Shawnee, Wyandot, Lenape (Delaware).

• Roche de Boeuf burial mound (burial) — Roche de Boeuf Farm, about a mile from the village of Waterville (Waggoner: southwest; Killits: above the village), pre-settlement; opened 1833, plowed level by 1923 (archive.org)
• Trail from Wapakoneta to Fort Malden (trail) — line of the main road through Waterville Township, late 1700s to 1830s (archive.org)
• Fort Deposit (camp) — near the Roche de Boeuf, by the village of Waterville, completed August 18, 1794 (archive.org)
• Tondaganie's reserve (treaty) — six miles square on the Maumee above the Roche de Boeuf, a short distance above Waterville, reserved by the Treaty of Detroit, 1807 (archive.org)

Timeline

1. 1794-08-18 — General Anthony Wayne completes Fort Deposit near the Roche de Boeuf; two days later his army fights the battle of Fallen Timbers downstream.
2. 1814 — Isaac Richardson builds a log cabin near the river about a mile above Waterville, on what becomes the Roche de Boeuf Farm; he is the township's first permanent settler.
3. 1816 — Richardson opens a double log house as a tavern, the first in that section; Gilbert, Milton and Solomon Underwood settle nearby the same year.
4. 1817 — The Adams family settles in the north of the township; John Pray makes his first visit and settles in 1818, with Orson Ballou.
5. 1818 — Adams, Hunt & Co. build the 'Old Red Ox Mill,' powered by oxen, about a mile and a half north of the later village.
6. 1819 — Gilbert, Milton and Solomon Underwood die of 'swamp fever' between August and October.
7. 1821 — John Pray builds the township's first grist mill on Granger Island, which he bought from the government after evicting a squatter named Granger.
8. 1825 — Hiram P. Barlow teaches the township's first school in the old Red Ox Mill; the first graveyard is opened on the Roche de Boeuf Farm about the same year.
9. 1828 — John Pray opens a hotel on the site of the later Columbian House (Wikipedia describes it as a trading post).
10. 1829-1830 — Isaac Richardson is shot dead on his tavern porch by George Porter (fall 1829 per Waggoner; July 22, 1830, per Killits).
11. 1830-02 — John Pray plats the village of Waterville, 50 lots opposite 'Pray's Falls'; Waggoner elsewhere gives 1831 and 1832 for the laying out.
12. 1831 — The Wood County commissioners set off Waterville Township from Waynesfield; the first election, on April 4, chooses James C. Adams, Jonas Cleveland and William Meeker trustees.
13. 1831 — George Porter is hanged at Perrysburg, the first legal execution in northwestern Ohio.
14. 1834 — A Methodist society is organized at Waterville with Rev. Elam Day as its first preacher.
15. 1838 — The township's first stone quarry is opened on the Dodd farm, after the building of the Miami and Erie Canal had created a demand for stone.
16. 1865 — A Mr. Hall of Portland, Maine, drills for oil north of Waterville and burns the shale gas from the hole as fuel, the first use of natural gas as fuel in the area.
17. 1874 — Wood and Lucas counties build the first bridge across the Maumee in the township, a $22,000 wooden truss at the old ferry near Pray's Falls; an iron bridge replaces it in 1888.
18. 1887-06-18 — Ballou Gas Well No. 1, begun May 24 on the river half a mile northeast of Waterville, is shot and proves the township lies on the northwestern Ohio gas belt; Oscar W. Ballou had promoted the search.
19. 1888 — The Whitehouse quarries employ 40 men and have ballasted the Wabash Railroad as far west as the Mississippi.
20. 1920 — Waterville Township reports 1,968 residents; its villages are Waterville (779), Whitehouse (513) and the unplatted railroad hamlet of Neowash.
21. 2020 — The US Census records 7,036 residents across the township.

Stories

The shooting at the Roche de Boeuf tavern

Isaac Richardson was the first permanent settler in Waterville Township, building a log cabin near the Maumee in 1814 on what became the Roche de Boeuf Farm, a mile or so from the later village. In 1816 he put up a large double log house and opened it as a tavern, the first in that part of the country, and for about two years he was the township's only settler. George Porter, whom Killits describes as 'something of a notorious character,' held a grudge against him. As Richardson sat on the tavern porch talking with a guest, Porter came around the corner of the building with a shotgun and fired into his head, killing him instantly. The guest, struck by a few of the shot, recognized Porter, who was arrested the next day, admitted the killing and was hanged at Perrysburg the following spring, the first legal execution in northwestern Ohio. Killits dates the killing July 22, 1830; Waggoner places it in the fall of 1829 and the hanging in the spring of 1831.

Gas under the Maumee

Men looked for oil at Waterville long before anyone found anything worth selling. In the fall of 1865 a Mr. Hall of Portland, Maine, sank a well about 60 rods north of the site of the later Ballou gas well; failing to find oil in paying quantity, he abandoned it at about 700 feet, having used the shale gas coming from the hole as fuel for the last 300 feet. The same season Robert Dunlap and others from Detroit drilled 1,100 feet on the Dodd farm and gave up. In the winter of 1886-87 Oscar W. Ballou visited the Findlay field, became convinced that Waterville's product was gas rather than oil, and interested Toledo and Cincinnati syndicates. Ballou No. 1, begun May 24, 1887, on the river bank half a mile northeast of the village, reached 1,104 feet and was shot on June 18, 1887; within a year nine gas wells had been drilled in the township, all but one successful.

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

Every historic place in Lucas County on the full map

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

• Waterville City49% of residentsMaumee River (via Bowling Green Reservoir)
• Whitehouse Village39% of residentsLake Erie
• Toledo City Of12% of residentsLake Erie

Private schools (1)

Museums, historical societies, gardens and zoos (1)

Facilities reporting toxic releases (1)

Spills reported since 2021 (6)

Auditor of State record

• No fiscal caution, watch or emergency on the Auditor of State's lists.
• Financial Audit, 2023 to 2024, released 2026-02-03

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