$3.8 Million Will Buy you a Whole Town in Indiana

    Photo credit: Michelle Pemberton             Source: tuckerbloomington.com

President Millard Fillmore
13th President of the U.S.
Photo by Mathew Brady
c. 1855-1865

STORY, INDIANA -- A small town in Indiana with a history that dates back to 1851 when President Millard Fillmore granted land to Dr. George P. Story is for sale. The asking price is $3.8 million.

The entire town is listed  by Christopher Cockerham of Bloomington Realtors, Bloomington, IN.

The town has an unverified permanent population of three persons, according to a recent profile of the town by Fox News.

TopTenRealEstateDeals.com
states that with Dr. Story's new medical practice, others soon followed to farm the land, harvest the acres of trees, and opened stores, a school, a church and post office. The town thrived in the early 20th century.

However with railroad and highway expansion that bypassed the area, a man-made lake that cut Story off from next-door Bloomington where Indiana University is located, and the Great Depression, the town eventually fell on hard times.

According to Wikipedia, in 1978, Benjamin (one name) and his wife, Cynthia Schultz, purchased four and a half acres that included the grocery store, grist mill, barn, and a small rented house.

They initially occupied the second floor of the store building as their residence. Benjamin, an architect and builder with restaurant experience, and Cynthia, a former restaurant owner, jointly pursued their vision of creating a bed and breakfast. In this manner, the "Story Inn" was born.

The general store continued to operate to some degree through the 1970s.

The Storys sold the Story Inn in 1992, and the town once again fell into hard times.

Frank Mueller

A federal bankruptcy was followed by receivership, and the entire town was sold at sheriff's sale on February 14, 1999, to an entity owned by Rick Hofstetter, an Indianapolis attorney and preservationist, and Frank Mueller, a German-born restaurateur.

 Hofstetter and Mueller had previously helped to renovate the iconic Athenaeum (Das Deutsche Haus) in Indianapolis, Hofstetter serving as the first President of the Athenaeum Foundation (from 1992-4) and Mueller as the manager of the Rathskeller Restaurant in its basement (from 1993-5).

Today, the Athenaeum is recognized as a National Historic Landmark.

The village of Story, Indiana, is now a country inn/bed & breakfast offering fine dining, catering, and accommodations. 

The second floor of the Old General Store (Wheeler-Hedrick General Store; local lore is that it was also once a Studebaker buggy dealership where wagons and buggy were assembled) has been renovated into four quaint bed & breakfast accommodations notable for their year-round occupant, the “Blue Lady.”

The Blue Lady is a mirthful albeit innocuous apparition with flowing white robes whose cheeky behavior has been observed by Story Inn employees and recorded in guest books since the 1970s.

The Treaty House, Doc Story’s homestead (Story-Griffitt House), the Alra Wheeler homestead (Wheeler-Hedrick House), the Carriage House, the Old Mill (Grain Mill), the Pruitt-Schultz House and another c.1930 house have each been tastefully and authentically renovated into guest cottages, many with kitchenettes and hot tubs.

Story’s Old General Store, replete with its creaky wooden floors, pot-bellied stove and long-retired Standard Oil Crown gas pumps out front, is now a celebrated gourmet restaurant open year-round serving breakfast, lunch and dinner. 

Much of the history of Story, Brown County and the region which straddles the Ohio River, is humorously depicted in Rick Hofstetter's book, Kentuckiana Roads: A Freidenker's Story of Life in America's Flyover Middle (Algora Publishing, NY: 2017).

In March, 2019, the village was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Story Inn hosts the annual Indiana Wine Fair in May. The Inn is just thirteen miles from the village of Nashville, Indiana and is located adjacent to the southwestern boundary of Brown County State Park.

Today, it is prosperous again attracting tourists from nearby Indianapolis, Louisville and Cincinnati for its gourmet farm-to-table restaurant, bed-and-breakfast, saw and grain mills and neighboring 15,776-acre Brown County State Park famous for its fall colors.

(photo credit: InsideIndianaBusiness.com)

During its heyday, Dr. Story’s town became one of the most popular places in southern Indiana, largely due to its well-stocked general store.

Farmers and their families would come to peruse dry goods and the newest farm implements, take care of their blacksmithing needs, see the doctor, take their grain to the grist mill, and attend services at the local church.

When the state government started buying up farmland around the time of the Great Depression for Brown County State Park, farmers were happy to leave. It had been a hard life trying to work the hilly, rocky land.

The general store, however, kept the town viable until 1950 and continued to stay open with diminishing trade through the 1970s.

Richard R. (Rick) Hofsteter and Friend

Since 1978, the town has had two owners and a year-round spirit, the Blue Lady, seen occasionally by employees and guests of the bed-and-breakfast portion of the Story Inn.

Today, former residents’ homes have been turned into guest houses, the old general store is now a popular regional restaurant with creaky wooden floors and pot-bellied stove and the big barn is a favorite wedding venue.

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