The city was named for Joshua Stow, of Middletown, Connecticut, a land speculator who was a member of the Connecticut Land Company which purchased a large portion of Connecticut's claim to the Western Reserve. Stow was successively part of Trumbull, Portage, and, finally, Summit counties. While the developer Stow visited the area often, he never lived here and delegated much to William Wetmore. The earliest settlers in the area included Robert Walker, William Walker and Joseph Darrow. Other early settlers were Captain Gregory Powers and family, Thomas Rice and family, Titus Wetmore, John Campbell and Joshua Starr. [1]
Stow/Munroe Falls Public Library, Early History of Stow. www.smfpl.org, accessed June, 2012.