Tipton County, Indiana: History
Prior to the arrival of non-indigenous settlers in the 1830s, the area of Tipton County was inhabited by the Miami and Delaware tribes. Tipton County was formed in 1844. It was named for John Tipton, a soldier of the Battle of Tippecanoe in 1811. Tipton served as United States Senator for Indiana from 1831 until shortly before his death in 1839. The first murder in the county occurred in October 1851. Harvey Moon killed Andrew Hornbeck with a knife. Moon was tried in Indianapolis, as a jury could not be empaneled in Tipton County. He was sentenced to five years in prison. He escaped prison and was not recaptured.
The first Tipton County Courthouse was a two-story frame building. It was planned in early 1845 and was completed by the end of the year at a cost of about $1200. It was expanded the following year. By 1858 a new courthouse was needed, and the brick building was completed by 1859 at a cost of approximately $15,000. The present courthouse was designed by Adolph Sherrer. He had taken over the Indiana Statehouse project when architect Edwin May died in 1880; five years after the completion of that project in 1888, Scherrer began work on the Tipton building, which was built of sandstone in a Romanesque style with a clock tower of 206 feet elevation including the flagstaff on top. It was built 1893–94 by Pierce and Morgan of Indianapolis at a cost of $170,988. It is one of several Romanesque courthouses dating from the 1890s that are still in use.