Courthouse conclusions : a study of county courthouses and their effect on rural Indiana : an honors thesis (HONRS 499)

This paper has been written to inspect the relationship a county courthouse has on a rural Indiana county seat. I had two main selection criteria: first, the county must have a population of under 15,000 people, and secondly, the courthouse must have been constructed before 1920. Of the 92 county courthouses in Indiana, 28 fit my selection criteria and were studied. The topics I felt important to write about in this paper include the selection of a county seat, the location and architecture of a courthouse, the architects chosen to design the courthouse, the physical condition of the courthouse, and the items displayed in and around the courthouse. It is my contention that all of these items show what role a courthouse played and is playing in the ever-changing county seat community.