The fort was built to serve as a supply station for the troops of St. Clair during his campaign in the Northwest Indian War.

Hamilton was first incorporated by act of the Ohio General Assembly in 1810, but lost its status in 1815 for failure to hold elections.

He gave a campaign speech in support of his fellow Republican, William Dennison, who was running for Ohio governor.

Specially built canals and natural reservoirs brought water from the Great Miami River north of Hamilton into the town as a source of power for future industries.

The hydraulic began about four miles (6.4 km) north of Hamilton on the river, where a dam was built to divert water into the system.

[13][14] The hydraulic remained a principal source of power for Hamilton industries through the 1870s when stationary steam engines became practical and affordable.

The hydraulic attracted auto manufacturer Henry Ford to Hamilton after World War I, when he sought a site for a tractor factory.

Its early products were often machines and equipment used to process the region's farm produce, such as steam engines, hay cutters, reapers, and threshers.

[16] By the early 20th century, the town was a heavy-manufacturing center for vaults and safes, machine tools, cans for vegetables, paper, paper-making machinery, locomotives, frogs and switches for railroads, steam engines, diesel engines, foundry products, printing presses, and automobile parts.

The Butler County Courthouse, constructed between 1885 and 1889, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places because of its monumental architecture.

Like Cincinnati, Hamilton attracted many German and Italian immigrants from the mid-19th century on, whose influence was expressed in culture, food, and architecture.

Hamilton also had a Jewish community; with increased immigration by Eastern European Jews, they founded Beth Israel Synagogue in 1901 as an Orthodox alternative to Hamilton's Reform synagogue, which had been founded by German Jews in the 1880s, when nearby Cincinnati was a center of Reform Judaism in the United States.

Since European-American settlement, diaries, anecdotes, folk tales, letters, and official records have provided documentation of relatively common severe floods in 1814, 1828, 1832, 1847, 1866, 1883, 1897, 1898, and 1907.

This resulted in a high rate of run-off from the rain: an estimated 90% flowed directly into the streams, creeks, and rivers.

An amount equivalent to about 30 days' discharge of water over Niagara Falls flowed through the Miami Valley during the ensuing flood.

The Miami Conservancy District withstood several legal challenges, and by 1915 it hired an engineering staff to develop plans for valley-long channel improvements, levees, and storage basins to temporarily retain excessive rains.

During World War II, the military declared the entire city off-limits to its enlisted personnel because of its numerous gambling and prostitution establishments.

[citation needed] Madame Freeze's and the long row of prostitution houses along Wood Street (now called Pershing Avenue) were notorious among soldiers.

Factories in Hamilton converted their operations to support the war effort, manufacturing military supplies, such as tank turrets, Liberty ship and submarine engines, and machined and stamped metal parts.

Until 1999, when the Butler County Veterans Highway was built, Hamilton was the second-largest city in the United States without direct interstate access.

[21][22] While at the time used extensively in the city's documents, letterheads, business cards and on local signage, the United States Board on Geographic Names did not include the exclamation point; nor did Rand McNally maps.

Built in 1866 by local philanthropist Robert Clark Lane, the library building has since been improved by six separate renovations and expansion projects.

In 2021, they won the Tom Seaver bracket and advanced to the championship game, where they lost to a team from Taylor, Michigan.

[37] The City Manager operates as chief executive officer, directing a workforce of more than 675 permanent employees and a $400+ million budget.

[citation needed] The city's council-manager government was established in 1926, based then on election by proportional representation with a single transferable vote.

"The PR STV ballot allows voters to rank order their choices in either at-large or multimember district elections.

"[38] Hamilton was one of several major Ohio cities that adopted the single transferable vote form of elections in the early 20th century; Ashtabula was the first in 1915.

The success of single transferable vote nationally led to a political backlash from bosses and parties that lost power.

In Hamilton, opponents mounted numerous campaigns to repeal the charter, finally succeeding after four failed referendums in 12 years.

[39] Since the city of Hamilton returned to plurality voting, the African-American minority has less frequently been able to win seats on the council.