Town Hall is located at 1006 Yellow Springs-Fairfield Road, Fairborn, OH 45324 Phone: 937-878-0611.
The historic architectural resources of Bath Township [†] represent the two major periods of growth in the 19th Century WesternReserve, These were marked by the construction of the Akron-Cleveland section of the Ohio-Erie Canal in 1827 and the railroads in the 1850's and 1860's. The significance of the buildings rests with their architectural integrity and their historic connections with people important in the settlement and development of Bath Township. The township itself is significant in its retention of the original township government and the five mile square township boundaries unique to the Western Reserve and in its maintenance of a rural character in close proximity to the cities of Akron and Cleveland.
While Ohio became a state in 1803, the land west of the Cuyahoga River in the Western Reserve was not secured by the government until 1805 with the Treaty of Fort Industry. In 1808, McArthur and R0 Warden surveyed Bath Township, then called Wheatfield, and divided it into 100 lots. Several white squatters builti log cabins and cleared small gardens in the township prior tp 1810. In that year, the first permanent settlers, Jonathan Hale and his nephew, Theodore Hammond, arrived in Bath. They were followed by other Hales and Hammonds, all of whom settled in the northeastern corner of Bath on the site of an old Mingo indian village. After the War of 1812, people began to settle in greater numbers. The area was organized in 1818 as Bath Township and, by 1820, had become a well populated rural community.
† Hope Ford and Tom Fisher, Preservationist, Western Reserve Historical Society, Historic Resources of Bath Township, nomination document, National Register of Historic Places, Washington, D.C., accessed May, 2025.
Nearby Towns: Beavercreek City •