4 minute read
Courthouse Bell Dedication
~story and photos by Amy Huffman Oliver
A300-pound piece of history was returned to the Brown County courthouse after being locked up in the local jail for the past five years.
Brown Circuit Court Judge Mary Wertz led a dedication ceremony on December 8, 2024, to commemorate the return of a 147-year-old bronze bell to a visible place of honor on the lawn of the historic courthouse. Local officials, two former judges and community members were on hand to hear something only heard by a few living residents—the ringing of the courthouse bell.
The current courthouse is the third courthouse structure on the prominent corner at the center of the village of Nashville. In 1837, the county built the first courthouse with logs. The building referred to as the “Old Log Jail” was built at the same time and still hosts visitors as part of the Brown County Historical Society Pioneer Village Museum.
In 1855, a two-story brick courthouse replaced the log building which was the was sold and re-purposed as a stable. In 1873, when the brick courthouse burned to the ground, the county re-built it in 1877 for a cost of $9,000 using portions of the walls that remained. The unique metal staircase on the north face of the building and the tower that housed the bell still stand today.
Although the history of the courthouse building is well-documented, little is known about the bell itself. Recent efforts by volunteers at the Brown County History Center archives failed to find any information about who designed or forged the bell or how much it cost.
Most bells have an engraving of the name of the foundry where it was cast, according to community member Duane Parsons, who spoke at the dedication ceremony. But this bell has no marking indicating its origin.
“The only artifact that was discovered by our History Center volunteers was a receipt showing that the clapper bolt was fabricated and installed in 1905. The cost of making this special bolt and installing it was one dollar,” Parson said. “The clapper weighs in at about 25 pounds.”
For 142 years, the bell tower kept the bell safe, even during courthouse renovations in 1939, in the 1950s, and in 1992. It wasn’t until an inspection in 2019 when county employee Ric Fox determined that the bell tower could no longer safely hold the weight of the bell. He rang the bell one final time before a crane removed the bell and it was sentenced to sit in the Brown County Law Enforcement Center for safe keeping.
“The bell has really been absent for far longer than that,” according to Judge Wertz. “As I prepared for this day, I sought to find stories of the bell being rung and was surprised that there are very few in the memories of our citizens. In fact, I think most of us did not even realize there was a bell in that belfry.”
Brown County resident Rick Bond remembers the bell ringing on the 4th of July in 1976 to celebrate the 200th birthday of the United States of America.
Wertz also found an article published in the Indianapolis News on November 11, 1982, which quoted Wilma Riley, a past elected auditor, recounting that the bell “was rung each morning when court convened and every night at curfew.”
Local attorney Jim Roberts heard the bell ring in 1946 when the Lions Club and the local undertaker, Josh Bond, conducted a “burial” of the town water pump to celebrate the opening of the first public water system in Nashville.
The bell refurbishment project was completed with minimal county funds as community members and businesses donated materials, money, and labor to make the project possible. Personalized bricks are also being sold which will be placed beneath the bell.
At the dedication ceremony, Wertz thanked Parsons. “We would not all be able to celebrate this moment without the determination and hard work of Duane Parsons. When the bell was removed from the building in July of 2019, Duane committed to returning the bell to a place of honor on the courthouse lawn.
“He spent countless hours rallying support, designing the structure, collecting donations, assembling a mostly volunteer crew of craftsmen and laborers, and cleaning the bell. He never gave up on the project.”
Then Parsons swung the bell, creating a sound that was five years in the making and that most in the audience had never heard before—the ringing of a piece of Brown County history.
