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Brown County Fifty Years Ago

1935; Indiana University Press; Linguagem: Inglês

1942-9711

George S. Cottman,

American Environmental and Regional History

Brown County's inherent poverty and its topographical relation to the most prosperous part of the state paved the way for its present publicity. Lying at the northern boundary of the broken country that distinguishes certain areas of southern Indiana from the level lands up state, it thrusts it self into the central plain as if offering its wild and pic turesque surface as a play-ground to the plainsmen of the North who are less favored with romantic surroundings. In the heart of it lies the town of Nashville, some forty miles from Indianapolis?an easy journey in this auto age. A succession of developments has placed Brown County in the limelight. After long years in which no railroad touch ed the County at any point, one of those harbingers of civili zation cut across a corner of the region, but missed Nashville by six miles, so there had to be a connecting bus. By reason of some mysterious atmospheric richness, the hills and dales and wild, woodsy landscapes are bathed in a beauty of tints all their own, and this, coupled with an abundance of log cabins and the quaint living conditions, survivals of the pioneer period, made Brown County a wonderful find for those persons who are searching for the unusual in human life and nature. Consequently the painter folk, Gypsies of Ameri can life, came drifting thitherward till by and by a full fledged artists' colony was established. Not a few members of the artist gild manifested their faith in the permanency of the wild country by buying prop erty and building homes there. A natural result has been that other people of idyllic tastes with leanings towards the idea of a lodge in the wilds began to look about for cabins where they might flee the madding world on occasion. In time, came Kin Hubbard, the creator of that most popular of rural characters, Abe Martin, whose sayings were for a score of years household words far and wide. The gifted humorist made Brown County his habitat, which helped not a little to keep that natural beauty spot in the public eye. More recently the state Department of Conservation has ad ded to its system of public holdings an extensive forest and game preserve near Nashville. The highest hill crest, Weed