Significant Dates in the History of Copley Township

Significant Dates

• 1655 - According to legend, battle of Fort Island between Erie and Iroquois Indian tribes.
• 1807 - (May 28) Gardiner Greene received title to 16,531 acres of land for $26,087 from the Connecticut Land Company.
• 1814 - (August 8) Jonah Turner purchased 321 acres in the Stony  Ridge area along State Route 18, becoming Copley's first permanent  resident.
• 1819 - (July 5) Citizens of Copley Township met and elected the first officers to govern the newly created area.
• 1820 - First industry in area - distillery and sawmill.
• 1831 - (August 31) Elizabeth and Gardiner Greene 'do hereby remise, release and forever quit claim unto the said citizens of the Township of  Copley and their successors, heirs and assigns, all my right and title  of dower in and to the above described premises.' Said premises being  two acres of land now Copley Circle.
• 1832 - (December 4) First post office.
• 1837 - Stage coach service offered to Copley for trips from Massillon to Cleveland.
• 1840 - Copley Township became a part of Summit County.
• 1843 - Copley's first church, 'First Congregational Society of Copley Township' . . . now the site of Copley Methodist Church.
• 1861 - Civil War broke out.
• 1891 - Train service to Copley begins. Copley Depot was built.
• 1902 - First town hall built.
• 1904 - Copley's first centralized school and current Town Hall
• 1937 - Volunteer Fire Department formed.
• 1958 - Northeastern section formed as the Village of Fairlawn within the Township.
• 1970 - Police Department formed. Sixteen-hour shifts during the day and early evening.
• 1971 - Village of Fairlawn became a city and seceded from Copley Township.
• 1973 - Police Department began 24-hour patrols.
• 1980 - (January 1) Political boundaries of Fairlawn and Copley officially separated.
• 1992 - Copley Fire Department manned 24 hours.

Railroad Depot

In 1974, when the old railroad depot on Sawmill Road at Cleveland-Massillon Road was threatened with demolition, a number of citizens banded together for its preservation and in the process formed the Copley Township Historical Society. The depot was moved to its present site on Copley Road just west of the cemetery. The restored depot and its adjacent also-restored caboose now serve as the center for the Society with about 50 members who meet the third Monday, of every month. You can contact the Copley Township Historical Society by calling Helen Humphrys at 330-472-5013.

Sources

Information from the following:

• "Historical Souvenir Book, Copley Township Sesquicentennial", Kiwanis Club of Copley
• "History in Our Back Yard" by Robert Imars.