Bidwell, OH

Bidwell is an unincorporated community in northwestern Springfield Township, Gallia County, about 11 miles from county seat Gallipolis. The 2020 census counted 863 residents, and the place has its own ZIP Code, 45614, despite having no village government of its own. It sits in rolling southeastern Ohio country, with the Ohio River and Gallipolis shaping the wider county. Bidwell is part of the Point Pleasant, West Virginia-Ohio micropolitan area, but its day-to-day story is rooted in Springfield Township.

Railroad tracks put Bidwell on the map in 1881. The settlement first took the name Blaccock after the Crispus Attucks, Hocking Valley, and Toledo Railroad arrived; Charles Heatly owned the land around the station, and his nearby house still stands. A station known as Porter Station handled passengers and freight, and the settlement later took the name Bidwell, honoring John Bidwell, the Prohibition Party presidential candidate in 1892. The old rail route is now part of a bicycle path across much of Gallia County, while an Ohio historical marker recalls the station site. Bidwell still carries that rail-town beginning in its name and layout.