Ottokee, Ohio
| Ottokee, Ohio | |
|---|---|
| Unincorporated community | |
![Ottokee as Fulton County Seat of justice on 1851 railroad map[1]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:1851_railroad_map_showing_ottokee_as_fulton_county_seat.gif)
Ottokee as Fulton County Seat of justice on 1851 railroad map
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 Location of Ottokee, Ohio |
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| Coordinates: 41°36′08″N 84°08′04″W / 41.6022735°N 84.1343917°WCoordinates: 41°36′08″N 84°08′04″W / 41.6022735°N 84.1343917°W | |
| Country | United States |
| State | Ohio |
| County | Fulton |
| Township | Dover |
| Government | |
| • Type | Unincorporated |
| Elevation | 781 ft (238 m) |
| Time zone | Eastern (EST) (UTC-5) |
| • Summer (DST) | EDT (UTC-4) |
| ZIP codes | 43567 |
| Area code(s) | 419 and 567 |
| GNIS feature ID | 1065222 |
Ottokee is an unincorporated community in Dover Township, Fulton County, Ohio, United States.
Ottokee was founded in 1850 with the driving of stakes to mark the geographic center of Fulton County, Ohio, and originally given the name "Centre." The village was renamed shortly thereafter at the suggestion of Col. Dresden Howard to honor the Odawa Chief Ot-to-kee. Chief Ot-to-ke (or Ottokee) was the last Native American Chief to plead his peoples' case to remain on their native lands in Fulton County, but to no avail.
In early years consisted of a courthouse, a two-room schoolhouse (pictured), two taverns, a dry goods store, and a grocery store. The village became the first seat of justice for the county. The first courthouse, of wood frame construction, was built in 1851. In 1853, the first jail was built, of wood planks and spikes driven in the planks. Nobody ever escaped on account of the wooden construction. In 1865, a new brick courthouse was built.
However, the first railroads were being built through the county. The first, the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway, laid in 1853, bypassed Ottokee to the south, and anointed Wauseon as a commercial center. By 1869, the county residents had voted to move the county seat to Wauseon, Ohio, and the move was completed in 1872, when the first court session was held in the new Fulton County Courthouse.
A new historical museum/welcome center for the county, one that will replicate the architecture of the first wooden courthouse in Ottokee, is now being built across from the county fairgrounds.
In 1895, the Lima Northern Railway Company was organized in Ohio. The LN built north from Lima through Napoleon and Wauseon, with a stop in Ottokee near the present county fairgrounds, then onto Oak Shade and Adrian, Michigan. In 1897, the railway changed to Detroit and Lima Northern Railway Company (D&LN), which subsequently became the Detroit, Toledo, and Ironton Railroad in 1905. After World War I, Henry Ford bought the DT&I railroad, and in 1925, built a new, faster track east of Ottokee, that passed through Delta, Ohio, relegating the DT&I railway serving Ottokee to a mere spur, which was slowly abandoned in the late 1950's. The old railway right-of-way paralleled Ohio State Route 108, just west of the highway.
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Wikipedia