175 years of Ottawa County

OTTAWA COUNTY – Ottawa County has something for everyone: Fishing, swimming, biking, historical sites and more.

Through its 175-year history and before, people have traveled to the area and found something they loved, many of them immigrants seeking a new life and land.

Ottawa County was formed March 6, 1840, from portions of Erie, Lucas and Sandusky counties.

However, there were people in the area long before white settlers made Ottawa County their home and marked it on a map. The native Ottawas had been in the area for centuries. The county was named after the North American Indian tribe of the Ottawa, which translates to “trader.”

Since then, it’s become a tourist destination for millions of people.

In 2013, visitors to Ottawa County spent more than $347 million, said Larry Fletcher, executive director of the Lake Erie Shores and Islands tourism group.

“There’s so much to see and do in such a concentrated area,” Fletcher said. “It’s got a lot to offer.”

Ottawa County is made up of various communities that include seven villages and 12 townships. As of the 2010 census, the population of Ottawa County was 41,428.

PORT CLINTON

The city of Port Clinton is not named for an Ohioan, but for a New Yorker who was called the “father of the Erie Canal.”

DeWitt Clinton was the driving force behind the Erie Canal —which became an immense success, carrying huge amounts of passenger and freight traffic.

In 1824, Clinton proposed building another canal from the mouth of the Portage River at Lake Erie to the Ohio River in Cincinnati — the beginning being what is present-day Port Clinton.

In 1827, Ezekiel Smith Haines, bought 1,212 acres of land for $4,000 and joined two other men in platting the village of Port Clinton. He named the town to honor Clinton and the link between it and the development of the canal.

But the canal project didn’t happen, and the Miami and Erie Canal was built from Cincinnati to Toledo instead.

Haines also named the streets of Port Clinton — from Fulton to Canal and Perry to Sixth — and reserved space for parks, lots for the courthouse, hotel, bank, churches and council chambers. Ezekiel and his wife, Charlotte, lived in Port Clinton for several years but left after the canal project fell through.

People began to flock to Port Clinton and settled there because it offered fishing and mild summers with picturesque views of the lake and Portage River.

Chazz Avery, from the Ottawa County Museum, said Port Clinton has been a tourist destination since the late 1800s, when people began to travel to the islands for vacations.

OAK HARBOR

Oak Harbor began in October 1832, when Joseph Wardlow staked a claim and plotted a village some 10 miles inland from the mouth of the Portage River in Salem Township.

Because the land was on the eastern fringe of the Black Swamp, it had many marshy bayou areas and numerous creeks. Adjacent to the swampy area, on the higher ground, were stands of virgin timber, which included oak, walnut, elm, hickory, ash and poplar.

It was originally called Hartford for the city in Connecticut, where many settlers came from, according to John Liske and Frank Gluth’s book “Images of America: Oak Harbor.”

In 1835, a German immigrant named Adolphus Kraemer moved to the area and dreamed of establishing a thriving, prosperous city. He opened a general store, a sawmill and practice law, medicine and farmed.

The timber industry thrived, and oak from the village was shipped across the country and the world. Accordingly, the village changed its name to Oak Harbor in 1863.

ELMORE

In 1818, a settler named Joseph Harris moved to the area to trade and live with the Ottawa natives. He braved the dangers and diseases of the Black Swamp to build his log cabin in present-day Elmore. He died in 1820, and the area was named Harris Township for him in 1825.

Jennifer Fording’s book “Images of America: Elmore and Genoa” tells of the Rice brothers, Ezekiel and Reuben Rice, who traveled from Columbus to the Elmore area in 1823 and platted the village. Rice Street is named after the duo.

Elmore was the site of the original manufacture of the Elmore automobile, one of the first companies bought up by W.C. Durant to form General Motors. The nearby beryllium plant is a key player in nuclear power, nuclear weaponry and space program technology.

Elmore is known for a famous ghost story the “Elmore Rider” or “Spooklight.” The story goes that a headless motorcyclist still haunts a road between Oak Harbor and Elmore decades after his death just after World War II.

GENOA

Genoa got its name through a clerical error. It was called Stony Station around 1835 when the first white settlers arrived. Residents decided in 1857 they wanted a more fitting name.

The murky streams and bogs that circled the town require residents to use rowboats to get around, so they decided to name it after the Italian city of Venice. But a clerical error caused it to be named after another Italian town instead.

The Village of Genoa Opera Hall was completed in 1886, and has since played host to plays, meetings and more. It is listed in the National Register of Historic Places and is classified as the oldest free-standing municipal building in Ottawa County.

LAKE ERIE ISLANDS

The Lake Erie Islands have long been considered vacation destinations for people to get away and relax.

But during the War of 1812 the fleet of Commodore Oliver H. Perry put in near South Bass Island before defeating the British in the Battle of Lake Erie. The site is now know as Put-In-Bay, as the ships were put into the bay for safe harbor.

Perry’s Victory and International Peace Memorial at Put-in-Bay entombs both the American and British officers killed in the battle.

Before World War I, Put-in-Bay had the famous Victory Hotel that had the first swimming pool allowing men and women to swim together. A fire destroyed the resort in 1919. The remains of its pool can still be seen at South Bass Island State Park.

According to the Lake Erie Shores and Islands tourism group, more than 750,000 people travel to South Bass Island and the village of Put-In-Bay each year.

MARBLEHEAD

Built in 1820, Marblehead Lighthouse stands at the top of Marblehead peninsula, which has been the roughest point on Lake Erie since the beginning of Great Lakes navigation.

The light began operation in 1822 and was operated by Benijah Wolcott, the first keeper. Wolcott was a Revolutionary War veteran and one of the first settlers on the peninsula. When Wolcott died in 1832, his wife Rachel took over for him, making her the first female lighthouse keeper, according to the Ottawa County Museum.

The Marblehead Lighthouse is the longest continuously used lighthouse on the U.S. Great Lakes and is one of the most visited destinations in the state of Ohio.

The Ohio State Parks Division of Natural Resources estimates more than one million people visit Marblehead Lighthouse State Park each year, with about 25,000 climbing the tower to look over Lake Erie and the islands.

jdenton@gannett.com

419-734-7506

Twitter: @jessicadentonNH