Milan Township is one of twenty townships in Allen County, Indiana, United States. Milan Township is located in east central Allen County, with the Maumee River meandering across the township. As of the 2010 census, its population was 3,749. The township is highly rural, with only 1,137 houses in the 2010 census. Many of the residents of Milan Township are Swiss Amish who mostly speak a Low Alemannic Alsatian dialect.[Chad Thompson: The Languages of the Amish of Allen County, Indiana: Multilingualism and Convergence], Anthropological Linguistics Vol. 36, No. 1 (Spring, 1994), page 69. Milan township is generally demarcated by Schwartz Road to the west, Notestine Road to the north, Sampson Road to the east, and Gar Creek Road to the south.
Towns and villages
The principal town in Milan Township is Milan Center, at 41°8'39"N 84°56'46"W. Milan Center lies at the intersection of Milan Center Road and Doty Road, and at an earlier time consisted of Brueggemann's (previously Van Camp's,Fort Wayne Daily Gazette, 24 Jul 1878, Wed, Page 4 a combination lumberyard, gas station, hardware and grocery store), a small wood-frame church, Milan Center School, a feed mill, and four houses. Additional enterprises have come and gone through the years.Harris, R. D. (2019, February 26). Reflections by Roger. East Allen Courier, p. 1.
Five Points is a settlement located at the junction of Old US Highway 24, Webster Road, and Woodburn Road, along the old Wabash-Erie Canal route. At one time it consisted of a small diner for truckers, a gas station (later a bicycle shop), a tile mill, and a few homes. A newer water tower labeled "Woodlan" near the Woodlan Schools may result in the community being known as "Woodlan" in the coming years.Churchward, Linda. "93 Allen County, Indiana Towns (Ghost) Past and Present." Allen County INgenWeb Project. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Dec. 2016
Gar Creek was once a shipping point on the Wabash and Toledo Railroad. A small community of 500 people eventually settled around the station. In 1883, lumber and grain were the primary exports of the station. Gar Creek enterprises at that time included a shingle manufacturer, two carpenters, a Justice of the Peace, a saw mill, a general store with a railway agent and a Postmaster (Jesse Rothgeb), a blacksmith, a hoop manufacturer, and United Brethren and Lutheran churches. The population at that time was listed as 130.Indiana State Gazetteer and Business Directory. Indianapolis, IN: R.L. Polk, 1882–1883. Print.
Thurman was a settlement located on the Detroit branch of the old Wabash Railroad. A few homes and businesses remain to this day.Churchward. Parts of Thurman were incorporated into Fort Wayne on March 31, 2008 as part of the "Schwartz Road Voluntary Annexation".Additional Schwartz Road Area Joins City. City of Fort Wayne. (2008). https://www.cityoffortwayne.org/latest-news/1192-additional-schwartz-road-area-joins-city.html.
Woodlan Schools The Maumee-Milan Consolidated School System (constituents: Maumee Township, including the city of Woodburn, and Milan Township) built and dedicated Woodlan High School for the 1959–1960 school year.Schumacher, Tom and Messmann, Dulanna, ed. The Arrow. 1960 ed. Woodburn: Woodlan High School, n.d. Print. Located in Milan Township, the school lies just east of Five Points on the Woodburn Road. Students previously attending Harlan High School began attending Woodlan in the autumn of 1965, as the area's smaller school districts had been further consolidated into the East Allen County Schools a year earlier.Janssen, Sarah, "EACS Had Grass-Roots Start". The (Fort Wayne) News-Sentinel. 14 January 2011. Web. 14 January 2011. Junior high and elementary schools are also now located on the campus.
Economy The major industries in the county are agriculture, building trades, and rubber manufacturing. The largest employer in the township is BF Goodrich. The plant manufactures BF Goodrich and generic-branded tires for passenger cars and light trucks. BF Goodrich is a division of Michelin North America. As of 2016, 1,650 workers were employed at the facility located on Old U.S. Highway 24. Shortly after opening in 1961, the mile-long plant was featured in the national media as the "longest" manufacturing facility in the country at the time. It has been upgraded and expanded subsequently several times. The facility, which lies just east of the Woodlan Schools, comprises the highest-assessed real estate and business personal property value in the East Allen County Schools' territory. Many plant employees are represented by United Steelworkers Local 715.Rodriguez, Rosa Salter. "Goodrich Seeks Tax Cut to Expand." The Journal Gazette. N.p., 13 Dec. 2016. Web. 13 Dec. 2016.
Laventure's Reserve The indigenous inhabitants of Milan Township were the Algonquian-speaking Miami People. In the "Treaty with the Miami" executed on October 23, 1826, one section, 640 acres, of Milan Township land was reserved for "Laventure's daughter", whose father, Laventure Toucher, was a French trader and whose mother may have been a Miami."Treaty with The Miami – 1826." Native American Indian Treaties, First People of America. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Dec. 2016.
Laventure Toucher had been convicted of treason by the British in Fort Detroit in 1779 during the Revolutionary War. The colonists had recruited neutral French inhabitants of the Detroit region to be spies and sympathizers for the American cause.Hoerauf, Geoffrey. "American Spies and Sympathizers at Fort Detroit (excerpts)". Early America. Varsity Tutors. Fall 1998. Web. 17 December 2016.
The reserved section occupied land bordered now by the Rohman and Platter roads. At the time of Indian Removal in 1846, those Miami who held separate allotments of land were allowed to stay as citizens in Indiana. Around 1872 the reserve was partially sold to non-native settlers, and by 1879, plat books were showing the "first family" Milan Township surnames of Lampe, Vondereau, Shafer, Bruick, Landin, and Yerks on that land."1879 Map of Milan Township." Plat Maps, 1880, Allen County, Indiana. Allen County Genealogical Society of Indiana, n.d. Web. 14 Dec. 2016.
Although the Indiana Miami were recognized by the US in an 1854 treaty, that recognition was stripped in 1897. While an Indiana Miami Nation still exists to this day, the officially US-recognized relocated Miami Nation resides in Oklahoma. In 1980, the Indiana legislature recognized the Indiana Miami and voted to support federal recognition.• Rafert, Stewart (1996). The Miami Indians of Indiana; A Persistent People 1654–1994. Indiana Historical Society.• Tanner, Helen Horbeck (1987). Atlas of Great Lakes Indian History. Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press. .
Early settlement prior to 1880
Milan Township was first organized by the County Commissioners in March, 1838, being petitioned for, and named by, resident Stephen Heath, in honor of Milan Township, Huron County, Ohio: his former home (the township now resides in neighboring Erie County). The origin of the "Milan" name in Huron and Erie Counties, Ohio remains obscure.CCM Graphics, Inc. "The History of Milan, Ohio." Milanarea.com, n.d. Web. 18 Dec. 2016.
Charles Shriner erected the first frame house in 1838. It was attached to a log building. Alvin Hall erected the second frame house in 1841. William R. Herrick erected the first frame barn in the spring of 1850."Allen County Indiana Township Histories: Milan Township History Bits". Genealogy Trails. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Dec. 2016.
The first road was surveyed in 1840 by Horace Taylor. It was called the Ridge Road, and extended from Fort Wayne to Hicksville, Ohio. The first stores in the township were operated by Stephen Heath and Lorenzo D. George.
The first township election was held in April, 1842; Andrew Wakefield was elected Justice of the Peace, and John Nettle, Constable. The positions were voluntary, as there were no salaries.
Amish settlement began in 1852–1853, when eleven wagons carrying fifty-two people, mainly recent immigrants from the Alsace, migrated to Allen County from Stark County, Ohio.[Chad Thompson: The Languages of the Amish of Allen County, Indiana: Multilingualism and Convergence], Anthropological Linguistics Vol. 36, No. 1 (Spring, 1994), page 71. Peter Graber was the first bishop. Three distinct divisions subsequently evolved in the community: the most-conservative Old Order Amish, the more progressive Amish-Mennonites, and the most liberal, the "Defenseless" (Egli) Mennonites.Hertig, Marquita & Fogle, Floyd, et al (2016). Harlan Indiana: Then and Now. Harlan, IN: Clover Printing Company, p.126
The Village of Fairport The settlement of Fairport, the first village in the township, was created by Eastern venture capitalists attempting to capitalize on the newly created Wabash and Erie Canal. The first post office was established at Fairport in 1843, with John Irvin being appointed Postmaster. Fairport straddled portions of Township Sections 13 and 24, in the far eastern part of the township, just south of the Maumee River."Milan Township 1860 Plat Map", acgsi.com
The heyday of the canal was 1847 to 1866, but the canal ultimately closed in 1878 as both shippers and passengers demonstrated a preference for utilizing the Wabash railroad instead, which had been built parallel to the canal."The Wabash-Erie Canal." Allen County (IN) Public Library. 1952.. Scribd, n.d. Web. 21 Dec. 2016. Fairport ultimately foundered as the canal foundered; the settlement became defunct and the site quickly reverted to farmland.
George Foxtater and John Irvin were the first tavern-keepers in the township, in Fairport.
Chamberlain Settlement The village of Chamberlain arose when one of the first township settlers, Alvin Hall, requested that a post office be placed in the "western part of the township." The request was granted, and Lorenzo D. George became the appointed postmaster. Chamberlain, located just southwest of Barnett Chapel on the Old Ridge Road in Section 4 of the township,"Map of Milan Township." Allen County, Indiana. Allen County Map Co., 1907. began its own decline around 1870, and the post office was relocated to St. Joseph Township at that time.
One-room district schoolhouses Support for rural public schools originated with the Federal Land Ordinance of 1785, which began the land surveys that laid out townships and sections across the growing nation. Every township was to consist of thirty-six sections containing 640 acres each. Section 16 and later, in 1848, section 36, were set aside to support schools."One-Room Schoolhouses." Encyclopedia of the Great Plains. University of Nebraska – Lincoln, 2011. Web. 17 Dec. 2016. That ordinance largely failed in Indiana, but a few townships actually did use their surveyed "Section 16's" for educational purposes, as prescribed in the ordinance.
Following statehood in 1816, the Indiana General Assembly then passed a complex series of acts (in 1824, 1849, and 1852) to organize and develop the public school system at the state, county, and township levels. School districts were created and given the authority to establish district schools at the township level. School district representatives were to be elected to the township trustees. State and local tax-support was provided on a county-by-county basis.
A number of schoolhouses were then built soon following 1852, but the majority were ultimately constructed following the Civil War. By 1900, over 8,000 one-room schools stood statewide. Later, with changes in demographics and the onset of school consolidations, the General Assembly gave the State Superintendent the means to close districts where attendance was under 12 pupils. Today there are over 700 surviving one-room schoolhouse structures in Indiana; the majority of these date from 1865 to 1900."Indiana's Public, Common and High Schools." Indiana Division of Historic Preservation and Archaeology, Web. 17 Dec. 2016.