Brownsburg History

Exploring Brownsburg history is like exploring the history of most of the small towns all over Midwest America. After treaties were put into effect with the Native Americans, the first white pioneer settlers began to arrive.

First on the scene in Brownsburg, Indiana was a hunter and trapper named James B. Brown, whose name lives on today in the town he helped create during the early 1800s.

By 1828, little schoolhouses were going up, and in those days, everybody went to school, kids and adults. Only the mothers stayed home.

The stagecoach line connected the tiny communities surrounding nearby Indianapolis. Then, some 50 years later, came the rails that were just beginning to criss-cross over the entire nation. The veins of the country were beginning to flow. By the turn of the century, trains were making stops every hour in Brownsburg.

The Brownsburg Public Library, still important to the town today, came into being in 1917 through a $12,500 grant made by the Carnegie Corporation. In the early days, the library doubled as the Police Department, and these days, the Brownsburg Chamber of Commerce still has its offices there.

The little town of Brownsburg, with about 18,000 inhabitants, might still move more slowly than its Big City neighbor, Indy. But it’s a vibrant and friendly community that takes care of its own as it welcomes outsiders. And isn’t that what life in Midwestern America is all about?