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In 1662, Charles II of England deeded to the Colony of Connecticut a strip of land running from the Narragansett Bay to the Pacific. This territory, approximately 720 miles long, included the present cities of Hartford, Cleveland, Toledo, Chicago, Des Moines, and Omaha. Subsequent royal charts, which often overlapped, caused the state to lose parts of the territory. By the close of the Revolutionary War, several states claimed western lands under their colonial charters or treaties made with Native Americans. As many of these claims were in conflict, the states were asked to cede their claims to the federal government.
Connecticut refused to comply. The small state argued that it needed the western lands for expansion. They finally proposed to cede approximately three-fourths of these claims provided they be permitted to "reserve" an area immediately west of Pennsylvania equal to the size of Connecticut at that time. The area was known as the Connecticut Western Reserve, or simply, "The Western Reserve." Thus originated the Western Reserve, an area whose inhabitants were destined to play important parts in the political, social, industrial and educational history of the United States.
After the Treaty of Greenville in 1795, by which the Native Americans relinquished all of the territory east of the Cuyahoga River, the eastern half of the Western Reserve was opened for settlement. Connecticut retained sovereignty over this area until 1800 when it was ceded to the territorial government. Ohio became a state in 1803, and the Western Reserve lies in the northeastern corner of the state.
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