Biohazard and Crime Scene Remediation in Payne, OH

Payne is a village in Paulding County in northwestern Ohio.

Payne was laid out in 1872 under the name Flatrock City — it was also called Malottville in its earliest days — and the village was platted under its present name in 1883.

The village is named for Henry B. Payne, a United States senator from Ohio.

The railroad arrived in the 1870s and was completed through town by the Nickel Plate in 1881, setting off Payne's growth.

By 1884 Payne had about 1,000 people, three hotels, some 30 businesses, four sawmills, a stave factory that made barrels, and a bucket factory, according to the village's own centennial history.

Payne published its first newspaper, the Payne Star, in 1883; through a long chain of sales and name changes, the paper eventually became part of the Paulding Progress.

Payne's population peaked at 1,614 in the 1930 census; the 2020 census counted 1,192 people in the village, and there were 497 households at the 2010 census.

The pond in Payne's village park is shaped like the state of Ohio.

Payne ran its own high school for 80 years — its first class graduated in 1891 and its last in 1971 — and since 1972 Payne students have attended Wayne Trace schools as the Raiders.

The village covers just 0.68 square miles of land and sits at an elevation of about 745 feet.