College Township

The "College Township" was the full survey township located in the northwest corner of Butler County, Ohio, now corresponding to the civil township of Oxford, designated by the Ohio General Assembly to be the site of the state university now called Miami University. When Congress, on May 5, 1792,^[1] authorized the sale to John Cleves Symmes of the land known as the Symmes Purchase, one of the terms was that he would allocate a full township of land to support a university, a promise he never fulfilled. The United States Congress subsequently allowed the State of Ohio to pick a township in the public domain for a college.^[2] They chose a township in the first range in the Congress Lands, namely R1E T5.

The village of College Corner takes its name from its position in the northwest corner of this section and the Indiana town of College Corner took its name from its Ohio counterpart.

When Butler County was originally divided into townships in 1803, this land was included in St. Clair Township, then later Milford Township before Oxford Township was erected in 1811.

Ohio's first appropriation for roads, passed at the second General Assembly, (February 18, 1804), included $1585 for the road from Chillicothe (then the state capital) to the college township via Lebanon.^[3] In Butler County, this corresponds to the present-day State Route 73.

References[edit]

^ 1 Stat. 266 - Text of Act of May 5, 1792 Library of Congress
^ 2 Stat. 225 - Text of Act of March 3, 1803 Library of Congress
^ Chase, Salmon P., ed. (1833). The statutes of Ohio and of the Northwestern territory, adopted or enacted from 1788 to 1833 inclusive…. Vol. 1. Cincinnati, Ohio: Corey & Fairbank. p. 408.

Bert S. Barlow, W.H. Todhunter, Stephen D. Cone, Joseph J. Pater, and Frederick Schneider, eds. Centennial History of Butler County, Ohio. Hamilton, Ohio: B.F. Bowen, 1905.
Jim Blount. The 1900s: 100 Years In the History of Butler County, Ohio. Hamilton, Ohio: Past Present Press, 2000.
Butler County Engineer's Office. Butler County Official Transportation Map, 2003. Fairfield Township, Butler County, Ohio: The Office, 2003.
A History and Biographical Cyclopaedia of Butler County, Ohio with Illustrations and Sketches of Its Representative Men and Pioneers. Cincinnati, Ohio: Western Biographical Publishing Company, 1882. [1]

[1] 1 Stat. 266 - Text of Act of May 5, 1792 Library of Congress

[2] 2 Stat. 225 - Text of Act of March 3, 1803 Library of Congress

[road-3] Chase, Salmon P., ed. (1833). The statutes of Ohio and of the Northwestern territory, adopted or enacted from 1788 to 1833 inclusive…. Vol. 1. Cincinnati, Ohio: Corey & Fairbank. p. 408.

[1]

[2]

[3]

v t e Ohio Lands
Six-Mile Rectangular System Surveys	Congress Lands Congress Lands North of Old Seven Ranges Congress Lands West of Miami River Congress Lands East of Scioto River North and East of First Principal Meridian South and East of the First Principal Meridian Michigan Survey Ohio Company of Associates Purchase on the Muskingum Seven Ranges Symmes Purchase Toledo Strip
Five-Mile Rectangular System Surveys	Connecticut Western Reserve Firelands United States Military District
Indiscriminate Surveys	French Grant Indian Land Grants Moravian Indian Grants Gnadenhutten Tract Salem Tract Schoenbrunn Tract Donation Tract Twelve Mile Square Reservation Two Mile Square Reservation Zane's Tracts
metes and bounds Survey	Virginia Military District
Land Grants	Canal Lands Miami & Erie Canal Lands Ohio & Erie Canal Lands College Lands College Township Dohrman Tract Ephraim Kimberly Grant Fort Washington Maumee Road Lands Ministerial Lands Refugee Tract Salt Reservations School Lands Turnpike Lands
Other	Historic regions of the United States Scioto Company Northwest Territory Ohio Country Ohio Company
Images from Commons