Colfax Carnegie Library

Built in 1917 (Neoclassical architecture). Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1994.

From the record

“The Colfax Carnegie Library, also known as Colfax Public Library, is a historic Carnegie library located at Colfax, Indiana. It was built in 1917, and is a Classical Revival style brick building on a raised basement.”
Wikipedia article Colfax Carnegie Library, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 12 National Register listings published here for Clinton County · listed in 1994 · category: Building · built in 1917, Neoclassical architecture.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building as contributing to the listing.
Address. 207 S. Clark St., Colfax, 46035
When was it listed? March 1994
Category. building
Township. Perry township
When was it built? 1917
Architectural style. Neoclassical architecture
National Register reference number. 94000230 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

The ground it stands on

1,406 words

The chapter on Perry Township in Combination Atlas Map of Clinton County, Indiana, published 1878 names Colfax. This is what it says, exactly as the scans read.

About 1870, the L., C. & S. W. Railroad was completed, passing direetly through Colfax. business of every kind. From that day until the present it has grown very rapidly. The appearance of her business houses, her splendid sehool building, churches, and many comfortable dwellings all indieate an industrious, intelligent, enterprising class of citizens.

Passage source: Combination Atlas Map of Clinton County, Indiana, published 1878.

The Indianapolis, Cincinnati & Lafayette Railroad, at first called the Indianapolis Railroad, was located in the year 1849, and finished about the year 1852, when Mr. Strowd laid out a town, to which he gave the cognomen Midway, which, after a while, grew into our present Colfax. In time, the tastes of the people became so cultivated as to render the appearance of the old log school house odious, and they erected, on the same location, a frame school house, to which the young, of course, were proud to go. This house, however, at last, grew too small, and an old church was appropriated to the use of school. Here gathered the motley crowd of children into an unhandy and uncomfortable room, to receive instruction from either the primary or principal teacher.

Passage source: Combination Atlas Map of Clinton County, Indiana, published 1878.

Machine-read from a century-old scan, so expect the errors a machine makes: misspelled names, dropped words, stray characters.

Read the whole chapter on Perry Township - 1,406 words on its settlement, mills, schools and churches.

Storms near this property

15 since 1998

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Colfax, the town this property stands in, in 15 storm reports between 1998 and 2025: 10 thunderstorm wind, 3 hail, 1 flash flood, 1 tornado. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
March 2023	Tornado (EF2)	Colfax	$700,000	Continuation of the tornado that first impacted Montgomery and Boone Counties (as an EF1 and EF0, respectively). The tornado continued to track to the northeast, parallel to and roughly 0.8 miles southeast of West Manson Colfax Road, while intensifying. Near the intersection of County Roads 700 South and 750 West a homestead ascertained EF1-intensity damage, with 2 outbuildings on cinder blocks completely destroyed, the collapse of chimney and significant roof damage.\|\|The tornado then reached peak intensity as an EF2 with peak winds of 120 mph, for about 0.5 miles prior to crossing US Highway 52 at the intersection with County Road 650 South. Through this most-intense segment, a large homestead lost large sections of roof structure, with a garage's brick walls blown out, while a large and poorly-anchored barn was destroyed; with a collapse of a nearby communications tower. EF1-intensity damage continued for another 1.6 miles towards Interstate Route 65, as a few barns were completely destroyed across this rural portion of southwestern Clinton County.\|\|The tornado caused minimal EF0-intensity damage for the following 2 miles, including where it crossed Interstate Route 65, while occasionally dropping debris the vortex had picked up earlier in its path. The circulation restrengthened to EF1 intensity for its final 1.7 miles, causing significant damage just before ending about 3 miles southwest of Frankfort: hardwood trees were downed at County Road 400 South; before extensive damage near County Road 300 South which included the destruction of several barns/farm outbuildings among corresponding tree damage, including a concrete tower and a silo (at separate buildings) both leaning southwest, while another farm outbuilding's roof panels were wrapped around trees.
August 2014	Thunderstorm Wind	Colfax	$30,000	WLFI reported numerous trees and power lines down in Colfax due to damaging thunderstorm wind gusts. Some of the trees were large white oaks. Many large sugar maple limbs were down too. Hail accompanied the wind resulting in some siding and roofing damage. No information on the size of the hail.
March 2025	Thunderstorm Wind	Colfax	$20,000	Top edge of brick facade on the front of a building extending above the roof line was damaged by thunderstorm wind gusts.
July 2023	Thunderstorm Wind	Colfax	$20,000	Thunderstorm winds downed power lines at County Roads 700 West and 380 South.
March 2025	Thunderstorm Wind	Colfax	$10,000	Thunderstorm wind gusts downed 9 power poles along County Road 750 West.
June 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	Colfax	$5,000	A barn was destroyed in this location due to damaging thunderstorm wind gusts.
June 2023	Hail	Colfax	-	Thunderstorm hail continued into southeastern Clinton County, as large as softballs in Kirklin.
June 2023	Hail	Colfax	-	Thunderstorm hail over southwestern Clinton County, with hail as large as 1.50 inches east of Coalfax.
November 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Colfax	-	An estimated 65 mph thunderstorm wind gust was observed in this location.
April 2011	Thunderstorm Wind	Colfax	-	A thunderstorm wind gust, estimated at 60 mph, was reported from this location.
June 2008	Thunderstorm Wind	Colfax	-	Trees were knocked down due to damaging thunderstorm winds.
June 2007	Thunderstorm Wind	Colfax	-	Trees were reported down by a trained spotter due to severe damaging thunderstorm winds.
June 2007	Hail	Colfax	-	no account filed
August 2002	Flash Flood	Colfax	-	no account filed
November 1998	Thunderstorm Wind	Colfax	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Clinton County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

1 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Photograph	Property	Distance	Listed
	Rosenberger Building	0.3 miles	1984

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 94000230 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Clinton County	All 12 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.