HISTORY OF CLAY COUNTY                      115

    The growth of Brazil from 1845 to 1850 was but a slow pace in
population, the government census of the latter-named year enumerating
a total of 84.
    But with the nucleus of a center of population—store, postoffice,
blacksmith-shop, church and school—coupled with the coming of the
Terre Haute & Richmond Railroad and the discovery and development
of block coal, the town began to expand—numerically, industrially and
commercially. In 1857, when additions were made to the town-plat, a
private census was taken, showing a population of 393, an increase of
368 per cent for the intervening period of seven years.
    Within this interval the primitive log houses gave way to a better
class of buildings and a number of new improvements were made, includ-
ing several business houses. Then it was that Robert Buskirk built the
two-story frame hotel on the corner of Main and South Franklin streets,
for which David C. Stunkard traded him sixty acres of land on Otter
Creek. This was Stunkard’s advent into the town, who was the most
active and prominent in affairs of the pioneer business men of the place.
In the year 1857 was built the first brick business house erected in the
town, on the southeast corner of Main and South Meridian, opposite the
First National bank corner. In the year 1858, on the 28th day of August,
the first M. E. church was dedicated, which was on North Franklin
street, west side, near the present church. The New School Presby-
terian church, on South Walnut street, was built the same year, and the
Old School Presbyterian house, on South Franklin street, the succeeding
year. The first public school-house, which was a one-story frame of
one room, on North Meridian street, east side, almost directly opposite
the site on which stands the present Meridian street city building, was
built in the summer of 1861, by L. R. Torbert, trustee of Dick Johnson
township, which was in use nine years. The first brick residence build-
ings were the Conley house, west side South Meridian street, purchased
and occupied by Dillon W. Bridges, on his removal from Bowling Green
to Brazil, later, the Daugherty residence (1858); the Hendrix residence
(1860), and the George A. Knight house, south side East Main street
(1863). The dates given to indicate the time of their building are from
memory only.
    From the Independent, weekly paper then published at Brazil, the
business interests of the town at the time of the breaking out of the Civil
war, in the spring of 1861, were represented as follows: General Mer-
chandise—Fletcher & Stunkard, corner Main and South Meridian;
Robert Conley (New York Store), south side Main street, between
Meridian and Franklin; A. W. Knight, corner Main and South Walnut;
Rowley & Shaffer, Olds & Brackney’s old stand, south side Main street,
between Walnut and Sherfey streets; Groceries—Cornelius Wagner,
the Bryson, or McCrea-Brown corner; Cyrus Y. Moore, and George
Kress, both on south side of Main street, between Meridian and Franklin;
Drugs—Jonathan Croasdale, south side Main street (Richardson corner)
Wm. H. Lane, south side Main, east of Meridian street crossing; Stoves
and Tinware—W. F. Summers, north side Main street, between Walnut
and Franklin; Lumber, Lath, Shingles, Staves, Grain, Coal, etc.—D. C.
Stunkard, mill and storage on the Vandalia Railroad, north side; Pot-
tery, Stoneware, etc.—William R. Torbert, south Walnut street, near
Vandalia railroad; Furniture and Undertaking—Albert Kelsey, north
side Main street, between Washington and Forest avenue; Boot and