Biohazard Cleanup Near Downtown Elida Elida, OH

Elida (pronounced ee-LY-də) is a village in Allen County, Ohio, and part of the Lima metropolitan area.

Elida was laid out in 1852 by Griffith John on the site of his farm's maple sugar camp, and the village was incorporated in 1878, with R. R. Murray elected its first mayor.

The village is named for the founder's brother, Elida John — a surveyor who moved to Illinois and died without ever seeing the town that bears his name.

Founder Griffith John had settled the area in 1831, guided through the wilderness by Jacob Turkeyfoot, when only four or five families lived in the township, and he eventually accumulated some 1,640 acres.

Elida's post office opened in 1854 and served the village for more than a century, until 1959.

The village's population doubled during the 1950s, jumping from 607 in 1950 to 1,215 in 1960 as Lima's suburbs grew.

The population of Elida was 1,923 at the 2020 census.

Elida had 708 households at the 2010 census, with an unusually high 65% of them married couples and an average household size of 2.69 people.

During the Lima oil boom of the late 1800s, the fields around Elida were among the best-producing wells in the region, and many were still producing 40 years later.

Elida is home to the Elida Local School District and a branch of the Lima Public Library, and NBA guard Dakota Mathias is an Elida native.