The whole register
The water gets the first say
A Dam That Stores Nothing
The structural logic of a dry retarding basin: embankment, ungated conduit, and the design water surface. Argues that the absence of a gate is the whole idea, not an omission.
Englewood, Germantown, Lockington, Taylorsville, Huffman
The five Miami Conservancy District retarding basins — their locations on the watershed, their individual capacities, and how they operate as a system rather than as five separate structures.
The Engineer Who Refused the Reservoir
Arthur Morgan's founding logic for the Miami Conservancy District in 1915: why he rejected impoundment in favour of empty valleys and ungated conduits, and how the district's taxing authority over the whole watershed made the system buildable.
The Levee Has Been Raised More Than Once
The construction history of the Troy levee through the middle of town — the original channel work, and the later raises that followed each revision of what the Great Miami might do at peak discharge.
March 1913, Read Through the Gauge
The March 1913 flood as an engineering datum: the peak discharge figures, the affected reach of the Great Miami valley, and how those measurements became the design standard the conservancy district was built to exceed.
What the Conduit Mouth Tells You
The Taylorsville dam outlet works — the dimensions of the ungated opening, the stain line on the concrete above it marking historical water-stand depth, and what normal-condition flow through it looks like versus a wet week in March.
The school has been here since 1930
Troy's Other Export
The Hobart Institute of Welding Technology — its founding in 1930, the range of programmes it runs, and its position as a national training resource at a moment when the American Welding Society's annual shortage figure has reached the tens of thousands.
The Wire Still Ships from Troy
ITW Hobart Brothers' welding consumables operation — the wire-line production floor, the product range, and why a town that trains welders also makes the wire they train with.
Anna Is Being Retooled
The roughly $700 million investment Honda is making at the Anna engine plant to build electric drive units — the scale of the conversion, the timeline, and what it means for the welding and fabrication supply chain twenty miles from Troy.
The $4.4 Billion Bet at Jeffersonville
The Honda–LG Energy Solution battery plant commitment at Jeffersonville, Ohio — the scale of the investment, the cell chemistry it will produce, and the skilled-trades workforce it will need that the region is currently short of.
Tens of Thousands, Every Year
The American Welding Society's annual shortage estimate — what the figure counts, why it keeps running ahead of training capacity, and why west-central Ohio is a sharper case study than the national average.
F&P America and the Stamping Supply Chain
F&P America Manufacturing's Troy operation — what it stamps, how it fits into Honda's parts supply chain, and what the EV retooling at Anna means for a press shop that has supplied the engine plant for years.
The town and its square mile
The Dome at the Centre of the Square
The Miami County Courthouse built in 1888 — its design, its dome, its position anchoring the Public Square, and what the building has housed in the years since.
Four Streets and a Fountain
The Public Square as a piece of urban fabric — the fountain at its centre, the angled parking on the surrounding streets, and the way the square sits in relation to the courthouse and the commercial blocks around it.
Built in Troy in the 1920s
The WACO Aircraft Company and the biplanes it produced through the 1920s and 1930s — specific models, production numbers, and the WACO Air Museum and Aviation Learning Center that now holds and flies examples of the type.
Hobart Arena's Long Card
The documented concert and hockey record at Hobart Arena — the acts and events it has hosted over the decades, and how a mid-sized arena in a town of 26,000 ended up with that kind of card.
The Tavern That Predates the Town
The Overfield Tavern, built in 1808 before Troy was incorporated, as a surviving structure from the settlement period — its construction, its documented use, and what it holds as a museum today.
What the Festival Has Always Been
The Troy Strawberry Festival as a recurring institution with a documented history — when it began, how it uses the downtown streets, and what its scale and continuity say about the town that runs it.
The Hayner House and What It Became
The Troy-Hayner Cultural Center — the building's origins, its architectural character, and the range of programming it has housed since becoming a public cultural facility.
The county and what sits in it
The Johnston Farm and the Canal It Sat On
The Johnston Farm in Piqua as both a documented agricultural operation and the site of surviving Miami and Erie Canal infrastructure — the lockkeeper's house, the working section of canal, and the historical record the state maintains there.
What the Locks Were Built to Move
The Miami and Erie Canal lock system in Miami County — the engineering of a lift lock, which locks survive in legible condition, and what the canal moved through this section of Ohio in its operational decades.
Tipp City's Canal-Era Brick
Tipp City's main street as a legible piece of canal-era commercial architecture — the building stock, the street width, and the relationship between the town's layout and the canal that ran through it.
The Stillwater and Its Retarding Basin
The Stillwater River as a tributary of the Great Miami and the Englewood Dam on the Stillwater as one of the five Miami Conservancy District structures — its specific location, its basin geometry, and what it contributes to the system's total capacity.
Twenty Miles South and the Record They Set
Dayton in relation to Troy and Miami County — the Wright brothers' documented test-flight record in the Miami Valley, and how that record is held and displayed at the National Museum of the US Air Force at Wright-Patterson.
What Manufacturing Employs Here
Miami County's manufacturing employment share — the percentage relative to state and national figures, which employers account for the largest portions, and why the county's industrial base has proved more durable than comparable Ohio counties.
The Largest Collection of Its Kind
The National Museum of the US Air Force at Wright-Patterson — the documented scale of its collection, the galleries that trace the Miami Valley's role in aviation history, and its position as the publicly accessible record of that history.