Blackford County (pop. 12,766) is west of Jay County. Indiana’s fourth-smallest county in square miles, it reached its peak population of 17,213 in 1900.
Blackford County in 1908
Blackford County was named for Judge Isaac Blackford (1776-1859), longtime chief justice of the Indiana Supreme Court. It’s the only Blackford County in the U.S.
Blackford County was a center of the Indiana Gas Boom, in the late 1800s. Today, about 70% of the county’s land is planted in corn or soybeans.
The county seat of Blackford County is Hartford City (pop. 6,220).
Courthouse (1894)
In the nearby city of Montpelier (pop. 1,805), the 1908 Carnegie Library is still open.
On the National Register of Historic Places
Montpelier is the hometown of Astronaut Kevin A. Ford . He graduated from Blackford High School in Hartford City in 1978, and was the pilot of the Space Shuttle Discovery in 2009.
Now a retired USAF colonel
The Point restaurant, west of Montpelier, is known for its fiberglass giant holding an ice cream cone.
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interesting about the gas boom towns; thnx.