Otisco Township is a civil township of Ionia County in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2020 census, the township population was 2,268. Township offices are located in the community of Smyrna.

Communities

  • Belding is an incorporated city situated within the northeast corner of the township.
  • Cooks Corners is the location of an early settlement in the township at near the junction of M-44 and M-91 just west of Belding.
  • Smyrna is an unincorporated community at , a few miles southwest of Belding near mouth of the Seely Creek on the Flat River.

History

The township was organized on March 6, 1838 from survey townships 7 and 8 north in range 8 of the Michigan Survey. Township 7 was set off as Keene Township on February 16, 1842. The name was taken from Otisco, New York.

The first white settlement in the area was where Dickinson Creek flows into the Flat River northeast of Belding. George W. Dickinson, in company with Thomas Cornell, both of New York, built a saw mill there in 1836. The settlement became known as Dicksonsonville, though when a post office was opened in June 1838, it was named "Otisco", after the township. Dickinson sold the mill to James M. Kidd in 1845, who platted the village as Kiddville and a post office reopened there with that name in February 1855. The Kiddville Post Office close in June 1894.

Cook's Corners was an important early settlement. In 1829, Rufus R. Cook, had led to the area a group of men from New York looking for prospective land for purchase. He returned in 1837 with his family. The post office in Dicksonville was transferred to Cooks Corners in 1839, with Cook as the first postmaster. He built a tavern there in 1846, which proved to be a popular area attraction, and a general store in 1850. The tavern was later a stop on the stage line between Ionia and Greenville. Cook platted the village as Cooks Corners in May 1856.

References

  • Otisco Township web site