Editing Canal Winchester, Ohio (section)

==History==
[[File:Old Canal Winchester Town Hall.jpg|thumb|left|Former town hall, now a substation for the Fairfield County Sheriff's Office]]Canal Winchester was founded in 1828 by Reuben Dove and John Colman. When construction of the [[Ohio & Erie Canal]] came through Dove's wheat field, he wanted to sue the state. The canal workmen instead convinced him that he would be better off laying out a town, because the area was midway between [[Columbus, Ohio|Columbus]] and [[Lancaster, Ohio|Lancaster]].<ref name= cwh>{{cite web |url=http://www.cwhistory.org/HISTORY.html |title=A Brief History of Canal Winchester |publisher=The Canal Winchester Area Historical Society| website= cwhistory.org |access-date=July 20, 2012}}.</ref> On November 4, 1828, Dove and Colman recorded the first plat for Winchester, Ohio, in [[Violet Township, Fairfield County, Ohio|Violet Township]], [[Fairfield County, Ohio|Fairfield County]]. Dove named the village after his father's hometown of [[Winchester, Virginia|Winchester]], [[Virginia]].<ref name= history>{{cite book| last= Bareis| first= George Frederick| url= https://archive.org/details/historymadisont00baregoog | quote= canal winchester 1828.| title= History of Madison Township, Including Groveport and Canal Winchester, Franklin County, Ohio| publisher= G. F. Bareis| year= 1902| page= [https://archive.org/details/historymadisont00baregoog/page/n196 162] |via= Internet Archive}}</ref>

Winchester flourished because of agriculture and transportation. The [[Ohio and Erie Canal]] brought passengers, freight and a means to transport grain to market. The first canal boat floated through Winchester in 1831. The village was named Canal Winchester when the post office was established in 1841, because there were five other locations in the state named [[Winchester, Ohio (disambiguation)|Winchester]].<ref name= cwh />

A local legend explains how Canal Winchester received its post office. On [[Halloween]], October 31, 1841, two teenage boys, as a prank, hooked two horses up to the foundation of the post office of the town of Waterloo and then pulled it across the street to Winchester.{{Citation needed|date= March 2018}} With this, the town of Waterloo was no more and Winchester was a legitimate village. The village was annexed to Madison Township, Franklin County, in 1851.{{citation needed|date=June 2024}}

In May 1866, the Ohio Secretary of State granted incorporation papers for the Village of Canal Winchester.{{citation needed|date=June 2024}}

In 1869, the railroad came to Canal Winchester, causing economic growth.{{citation needed|date=June 2024}}