Indianapolis- a historical and statistical sketch, 1870,WR Holloway

PLAN OF THE TOWS. 13
the eastward bend of the river. In the centre of this tract a plat of one mile square
was made for the capital. It may be remarked here, however, that the donation is
not exactly in the centre of the State, nor is the old plat of the city exactly in the
centre of the donation. The latter is a mile or two northwest of the centre of the
State. The location of the city in the donation was determined mainly by the position
of Pogue's Creek. To have put the city in the centre of the donation would have
taken the creek too nearly through the middle of it, and the valley of that stream was
a very uninviting locality in those days. To avoid it the plat was located further
north and the centre placed at the circle. A beautiful little knoll further recommended
this point.
On this central knoll a circle of about four acres was laid off as the starting
point, and a street eighty feet wide thrown round it. From the extreme corners of
the four adjacent squares, avenues were sent out to the northeast, northwest, southeast,
and southwest. The first street south was made one hundred and twenty feet
wide, and called "Washington" then, and is so called now, but for many years it was
called " Main " street. The remainder of the square mile was laid off in regular
squares of four hundred and twenty feet, separated by ninety feet streets following
the cardinal points of the compass, and divided by alleys of thirty and fifteen feet,
crossing each other at right angles in the centre. The boundary streets, East, West,
North and South, were not included in the original survey. The Commissioner
seems to have thought that nobody would ever live on the outside of the last line of
squares and made no provision to reach any but the inside. These streets owe their
existence to James Blake, who represented their importance to Commissioner Harrison,
and he subsequently added them to the plat. The "out-blocks, " or divisions of the
donation outside the original plat, were made some time afterwards. Nobody dreamed
that the young town could grow all over the old plat, the " out-lots, " and a great deal
of the country outside of both, as it has.
The surveys having been completed and mapped as required by law, the sale of
alternate lots was advertised to be held on the tenth of October, by General John
Carr, State Agent. At the appointed time it was held in a cabin occupied as a tavern
by Matthias Nowland, a little west of the present line of the canal, on Washington
street. Although the main settlement was on the river, as new settlements always
are, the sickness that had hardly yet passed away convinced the people that they must
move farther off, and river lots did not sell well. The sales lasted several days and
three hundred and fourteen lots were sold for $35,596 25, of which one-fifth, $7,119 25
was paid down, the remainder to be paid in four equal annual instalments. The lot
on the northwest corner of Delaware and Washington streets brought the highest
price, $560, and one west of the State House square sold for the next highest price,
$500. Prices generally ranged between $100 and $300.
The progress made in the disposal of the town site and the .adjacent out-lota of
the donation, gave but a feeble promise of the future growth of the town. After the
first sales, lots, as the market phrase has it, were "dull and inactive." Of the three
hundred and fourteen sold one hundred and sixty-nine were forfeited or exchanged
for others. The reserved lots only alternate lots were first sold and those that had
been forfeited, were offered for sale repeatedly, but unavailingly. Money was scarce, of
course, as it always is, and the reputation of the town for health was bad. The
capital, though assigned to the town, might be kept away for years, as it was. The
outlook was unpromising. The growth was slow, so slow that as late as 1831, three-
fourths of the town site and donation remained unsold. In that year the Legislature,
by putting a minimum price of $10 upon the lots, managed to get rid of most of them,