A fertile valley carved by ancient glaciers and Redstone Creek gave way from open grassland and wildflowers to an early pioneer community in Dakota Territory when the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad pushed westward and Manchester was established. After briefly being called Fairview, the town took the name of its first postmaster, Chester H. Manchester, and its post office opened on June 29, 1881. The Black and Yellow Trail, a precursor of Highway 14, later ran down its main street. Manchester grew to include family homes, a Town Hall, grocery stores, livery barns, a lumber yard, two grain elevators, a depot, a restaurant, a cream station, a bank, a pool hall, auto repair and blacksmith shops, gas stations, two churches, township schools including Manchester High School, a hotel, a newspaper, and a well-known Town Pump. As transportation improved, people increasingly sold grain and bought supplies in larger towns, the population declined, and Manchester was eventually destroyed by a devastating tornado on June 24, 2003. The community's pioneering spirit has endured in the creativity, determination, and neighborliness of those rooted in Manchester Township.