The Miami Military Institute (MMI) was a military college located in

Germantown, Ohio Germantown is a city in Montgomery County, Ohio, United States. The population was 5,547 at the 2010 census. A part of the Dayton metropolitan area, Germantown was founded by German Americans from Pennsylvania and was once home to a cigar ind ...

, which operated between 1894 and 1933. The school's parade grounds were on the current location of the Veteran's park in Germantown.

History

In 1885, Orvon Graff Brown leased a propriety in Germantown and used it to establish Twin Valley College and Ohio Conservatory of Music. In 1894 the music program was dropped in favor of military studies. The school operated until closing its doors in 1934, due to the drop in enrollment due to the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

. Almost 150 cadets of the academy served in

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, more than half of them as commissioned officers. Seven of these cadets died in the conflict.

Post-MMI building history

From the 1940s to the 1980s, the building that was once the MMI acted as a Methodist camp, and was affectionately known as "Camp Miami" by locals. It was later a very popular location for

Urban exploration Urban exploration (often shortened as UE, urbex and sometimes known as roof and tunnel hacking) is the exploration of manmade structures, usually abandoned ruins or hidden components of the manmade environment. Photography and historical inter ...

from the 1990s to 2015. By 2015, however, the building had been heavily vandalized. Most of the exterior windows had been broken by vandals and urban explorers trying to gain entry, and the roof was on the verge of collapsing due to lack of maintenance. Restoration costs were far too high, so during the summer of 2015, the buildings on the site were demolished, and the asphalt parking lot removed. As of 2016, the only remaining structure on the site is the MMI's flagpole. The school's infirmary still stands, on South Main Street in Germantown.

Museum displays

Artifacts from the MMI can be found on display at both the Germantown historical society museum, located on West Center Street, and at the Veteran's Memorial Museum, located on South Main Street.

References

{{authority control Defunct private universities and colleges in Ohio Military schools in the United States Germantown, Ohio