Saturday, November 19, 2011

City Hall and the Jail

The first picture below is of the Rich Hill Calaboose (City Jail). The structure is made of sandstone, which I find interesting because the city hall is made of brick. I often wondered if city hall and the jail were built at the same time, I am now closer to finding that answer. Below this picture of the jail are 3 more pictures which happen to be old city maps I recently found. The first map picture is a layout from 1888 it shows no city hall or jail. The second map dated 1893 of the same area shows some kind of fire station with a bell tower and the jail is built. Finally, the last map is of the area in 1898 and you can see city hall is now built with the jail or Calaboose next to it. These maps prove that the jail was built first sometime between 1888-1893. The maps also prove the city hall was built sometime between 1893 & 1898. It has been said, that the Rich Hill City Hall was built in 1896 which according to these maps is correct. From these maps I now have a time frame as to when the jail was built.



Map #2-1893
Map #3- 1898











1 comment:

David K. Bennett said...

Thank you Bart for posting this, the history of Rich hill is very interesting !!