Attractions

Curwood Castle Museum

Businesses

Target.com

Verizon Wireless

Wal-Mart

Community Information

Owosso-Corunna Area Chamber of Commerce Website

Genealogy

Family & Local Histories Information

View Original Census Records

Golf Courses

Bennington Golf Club

Local History

An early settler wrote these lines:

"From this point we will onward go,

Till we reach the site of Owosso.

Eight and fifty years ago,

As the writer very well doth know,

This place was reached by two young men,

They were A.L. Williams and brother Ben,

Where they found the Indian Chief Wasso,

And gave it his name with the prefix O."

The Ojibwa chief referred to as Wasso signed at least four treaties.  In the treaty signed at Saginaw in 1819 it reads as Wassau, meaning "far off."  In his last treaty signed at Flint River in 1837, his name is translated as "The Bright Light, or light falling on a distant object."  His name is spelled Wasso in all but the first treaty.  Local folklore recalls the Legend of Owosso:  A Chippewa Chief adopted into his tribe a fugitive Sauk (enemies of the Chippewa) brave, Bukadawin who became the husband of the Chief's daughter, Princess Natomo.  Soon after, a son was born to the young couple.  Chippewa brave Spotted Snake one day drew his bow with poisoned arrow aimed at Bukadawin.  Natomo saw him and threw herself upon her husband to save him.  She was killed by the arrow.  Bukadawin named his son Wasso, meaning "one bright spot," as a sign of the one remaining joy of his life.

The first settlers in the township were Elias Comstock, Lewis Findley, and Kilburn Bedell.  John Overton and David Van Wormer, employees of Comstock, erected a double log house near the river -- the first building in the present city.  The settlement was first known as Big Rapids.  Give a P.O. as Owasso in 1838, which was not officially changed to Owosso until 1875, though the latter spelling was in use by 1844.  Platted in 1838, incorporated as a city in 1859.

Informational excerpts from Michigan Place Names, by Walter Romig, L.H.D.

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