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People
The people of the record: how this section is built
1830–2026 · the sources of the lives
A town of fewer than two thousand people keeps its biography in a handful of books. The fullest of them is the Olive Township chapter of Chapman's 1880 county history, whose anonymous canvassers sat down with the township's old…
Richard Carlisle, the founder — and Professor Risley
1814–1874 · proprietor of the plat, 1835
The man who laid out New Carlisle in 1835 signed the town's founding document "Richard R. Carlisle, Proprietor" — and the record has never agreed on the rest of his name. Howard's history prints him as Richard R. Carlisle.…
Lazarus Bourissa and the treaty-grant families
1826–1835 · the townsite's first owners of record
The first people named on the townsite's paper are not settlers but scholars. The schedule attached to the Treaty of 1826 (7 Stat. 299) grants quarter-sections in this township to named graduates and pupils of the Carey Mission…
The first settlers of the township
1830–1837 · the settlement generation
Chapman's chapter opens with the living ancients of 1880, and their names are the township's founding roll. Oldest of them in the town itself was Barvilla Druliner of New Carlisle — the county's commissioners' record of November…
Charles and Olive Vail: the woman the township is named for
1830–1880 · Olive Township's name
Olive Township is named for a settler's wife, and in 1880 she was still there to be asked. Charles Vail settled in the township in 1830 and was afterward elected a county judge. His wife was Olive (Stanton) Vail. Howard preserves…
Terre Coupee's founders: Hubbard, Egbert, and the man named Hamilton
1830–1861 · the rival town on the Chicago Road
Before New Carlisle had a rival railroad, it had a rival town, and the rival town had three founders and a namesake nobody named. Samuel Garwood sold a prairie tract about 1836 to Jonathan Hubbard, who laid out Terre Coupee upon…
The stage-road town: Cranmer, Ivens, the Mathews store — and Schuyler Colfax
1836–1847 · innkeepers and a future Vice President
New Carlisle's first decade ran on the stage line, and its most famous life passed through a store on it. Richard Cranmer built the town's hotel in 1836 and sold it to Joseph Ivens, whose house won, Chapman says, a "great…
The Services: J. H. Service and George H. Service
1834–1880 · storekeepers, bankers, the town's first family of business
For half a century the town's credit, its college and its water all ran through one family. J. H. Service was born in New York 15 November 1812, son of Philip and Clara (Hall) Service, came to New Carlisle at twenty-two, and…
The prairie holders: Reynolds, Clark and Ranstead
1834–1880 · the great Terre Coupee estates
Terre Coupee Prairie made three fortunes, and Chapman ranks them. John Reynolds, of the prairie, was "said to be the richest man in St. Joseph county"; with his brother James Reynolds, and with Henry H. Clark and H. B. Ranstead…
T. J. Garoutte: merchant, trustee, legislator
1823–1880 · twenty years a trustee, one term in the Legislature
The boy whose mother froze to death in the settlement's first winter grew up to hold its offices for a generation. T. J. Garoutte was born in Ohio 19 December 1823, son of James S. and Mary (Babington) Garoutte; the family came…
McDonald
1837–1880 · the town's first doctors of record
New Carlisle's medicine was practiced for forty years by two men whose sketches survive. Dr. He owned his residence in New Carlisle, was a deacon of the Christian Church — he had married Charlotte Compton in 1835, a first link in…
The teachers: Samuel Bate and Professor Rowell
1834–1880 · the school's founding generation
The township's first schoolmaster arrived, Chapman says, on a date that never happened. Samuel Bate was born in 1801, son of Joseph and Priscilla (Ayers) Bate of New Jersey, educated in subscription schools, and teaching from the…
Fred G. Miller and the Polanders
1865–1880 · the importer of the Terre Coupee Polish settlement
The Polish township that worships at Terre Coupee began as one man's import business. Fred G. Miller, born in Germany in 1835 and educated in its high schools, came to La Porte County in 1854 and became a farmer, contractor and…
Names that run through the record: the Comptons and the publisher's family
1829–1906 · informants, liverymen, editors
Some families appear once in a town's record; the Comptons appear at every joint of this one. Hugh V. Compton, born 18 September 1829 in Butler County, Ohio, brought to this county at six, kept "a first-class livery stable" in…
The twenty-three oldest: the census list of 1880
1880 · every resident over seventy-five, as the enumerators returned them
Chapman's strangest list is a roll of survival. From the 1880 census, as furnished by the enumerators and filed in the clerk's office at South Bend, Chapman prints every person in the county over seventy-five. Olive Township's…
The long tail: the rest of the 1880 sketches, name by name
1880 · Chapman's remaining personal sketches of the township, in register form
Chapman's canvass left no substantial householder unsketched; the rest of his roll is printed here at register strength so that no name he carried is dropped. John Anderson (born in Sweden 26 September 1832, son of Andrew…
The people in office today
As of November 2026 · carried whole in the government leg's file
The living holders of the town's public roles are named here once, in their roles, and their courses are the government file's. The Town Council stands: President Marcy Kauffman, Vice-President Jerry Colanese, and members Nancy…
The fame sweep, tested: who else the world knows from this ground
The standing sweep · ties stated exactly
The sweep for lives the wider record knows returns four names, and no more. Richard Risley Carlisle: born elsewhere, founder here at twenty-one, famous everywhere — his tie is the plat of 1835, stated in his article above.…
Notable People: Open Questions
What the record does not carry, and what would settle it
Four gaps stand open in the people's record, each with its settler named. (1) The first-married couple of the township: Chapman denies the atlas's Vail–Stanton answer and gives none; the county marriage record from 1830 settles…
The people leg opened with the settler founder alone and scattered the rest of its fame through other files. This addendum sets the founding frame the checklist demands — Indigenous and settler founders in one opening, each at profile size — profiles the presidents as far as the record reaches, runs the fame fields name by name, and brings the business founders home to People.
The founders, on both sides of the ground
1826–1835 · THE TREATY SCHEDULE AND THE PLAT RECORD
The town's first owners of record are scholars; its founder is a showman who bought their ground. On the Indigenous side the founding is a treaty paper: the schedule attached to the Treaty of 16 October 1826 (7 Stat. 299) granted…
The presidents, first to current, at profile size — as far as the record reaches
2008–2026 · THE MINUTES RECORD; THE EARLIER SPAN UNREACHED
The checklist wants a succession of profiles, first mayor to current holder; a town has presidents, and its profiles begin in 2008, because the minutes begin there online. Carolyn Higgins — elected president unanimously in 2008…
The fame fields, name by name: screen, stage, fashion, invention
Swept November 2026 · ONE POSITIVE, THREE TESTED NEGATIVES
The fame sweep's residue demanded a field-by-field test, and the fields answer one positive and three negatives. Stage — positive. The town's stage name is its founder: Professor Risley, born Richard Risley Carlisle, the acrobat…
The Brummitts, cross-carried: hardware, bank, and the mercantile company
1897–1963 · THE BUSINESS RECORD, LIFTED TO PEOPLE SIZE
The business founders who built this town's second anchor house stood in Businesses at full size and in People not at all; here is their profile, at People size. The Brummitt brothers built two institutions out of one building: a…
The political set: one name the ground touches, and the office that is not its own
1836–1869 · THE TEST PRINTED WHOLE
The political field was never run as a field in the fame sweep, and here it is run — to a negative that matters. The one political name this ground touches is Schuyler Colfax: as a boy he clerked here, on the stage road, and the…