Founding year: Wikipedia. First post office: 1812.The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Madison Township’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Madison Township is more historic than 96% of U.S. towns, #62 of 593 in Indiana. All 3 inputs are above most U.S. towns; its National Register listings ranks highest and its age lowest.
A+
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Madison Township’s overall grade.
Indiana towns list more on the Register than most of the country (a typical Indiana town has 7.9 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Madison Township’s 937 sits above most of its state (98% of Indiana towns have fewer) while its 1,683 historic buildings outnumber those of 99% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from A− to A+. The pre-1940 share is a Census survey estimate (±3.3 points). Two sources give 1810.
Founding year: Wikipedia (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Madison Township’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
Madison was laid out and platted in 1810, and the first lots were sold in 1811 by John Paul. It had busy early years due to heavy river traffic and its position as an entry point into the Indiana Territory along the historic Old Michigan Road. Madison's location across the Ohio River from Kentucky, a slave state, made it an important location on the Underground Railroad, which worked to free fugitive slaves. George DeBaptiste's barbershop in town became a nerve center of the local group. By 1850, Madison was the third-largest city in Indiana (after New Albany and Indianapolis), and among the 100 largest cities in the U.S.
Passages that mention Madison Township, cut from the printed page as they were published.
History of Madison Township, including Groveport and Canal Winchester, Franklin County, Ohio1902 · page 119Read the page →
Read the text
September 17, i860, a committee was appointed by the Board of Education of Madison Township consisting of Jacob Sarber, Wm. Perrin and Henry Long 'Tor the purpose of visiting the school houses in sub-district No. 18 to ascertain whether they have school room enough, and to report at the April meeting.” On April 15, 1861, this committee submitted a report which "was received and the committee discharged/’ and on
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
History of Madison Township, including Groveport and Canal Winchester, Franklin County, Ohio1902 · page 76Read the page →
Read the text
We will supplement the list of township officers with a list of Madison Township citizens who have held county, state and other honorary positions. In October of 1827 John Swisher succeeded James Kilbourne as county assessor, and served until 1835.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
Timeline
Madison Township, 1810 to 1956
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Madison Township. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
1956Clifty Falls sheet · 1:24,000
U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Madison Township.
Then & now
Stand where they stood
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Retake this viewLieutenant Colonel William G. Mank provides the eulogy at the funeral of Lieutenant Colonel Jacob Glass, Madison, India…, 1863
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Madison Township’s page.
In 1810, according to Wikipedia’s history of the town. Madison Township’s post office opened in 1812, and the census of 1840 counted 3,798 people here.
How does Madison Township rank for history?
Madison Township is more historic than 96% of U.S. towns, #62 of 593 in Indiana. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
What is on the National Register in Madison Township?
7 listings, 3 of them National Historic Landmarks: 2 buildings, among them the Lemuel Allen Farm (listed 2016, the first). 1,683 historic buildings in all.
How old are the homes in Madison Township?
25% of Madison Township’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±3.3 points), against a typical 14% for an Indiana town; the median home was built in 1970.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
From Wikimedia Commons (4), Wikidata (1), the National Register of Historic Places (2), Wikipedia, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
1865
2013
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