Ben and Cathy Fulton
Named after Abraham Owen, a colonel who died at the Battle of Tippecanoe, Owen County was formed in 1819. Comprising 387 square miles, there were approximately 800 people who lived in the county in 1820, but in the next ten years the population quintupled to about 4,000. Currently around 20,000 people live in Owen County. The White River passes through the eastern part of the county.
The earliest evidence of occupation in Owen County is found in burial mounds throughout the county that were created by Native Americans. The Native Americans, who were of the Miami, Potawatami, Eel River, and Delaware tribes, planted corn on the rich bottomland and hunted wild game, which was abundant on the rolling, wooded uplands.
In 1809, when pioneers came to this area, the natives ceded to them most of the area that is now Owen County. The treaty that transferred this land was called the Treaty of Fort Wayne. The boundary established by this treaty, known as the Ten O’Clock Line, runs diagonally across the northeastern part of the county.
Ben and Cathy Fulton