166                 HISTORY OF CLAY COUNTY

    Coalmont has a modern, up-to-date schoolhouse, built in 1908, by
Trustee George Phegley, of Lewis township, at a cost of $6,000, dedicated
December 19th. The situation here in the school capacity is somewhat
phenomenal. The latest building, that now being used, stands on the
south side of tbe town, while on the north side stands a comparatively
new two-story brick, built in 1904, unoccupied and practically abandoned.
The explanation as given the writer is that the house on the north side,
which stands but three-fourths of a mile from the plant of the United
States Powder Company, was so shaken up by the explosion of the 17th
of March, 1908, as to leave it in an unsafe condition. It is said, too,
that as another source of danger to the building, the site on which it
stands has been undermined. From these and additional reasons, an
inspector of public buildings officiating by the authority of the State of
Indiana, after having visited and viewed the situation, condemned the
building. Coalmont occupies a beautiful and desirable building and resi-
dence site, with an estimated population of 650.

                                MIDDLEBURY.

    Middlebury, a pioneer town in the central part of Harrison township,
eighteen miles directly south of Brazil, founded by John Cooprider in
1836, so named simply from selection, the founder having committed to
his son, Elias Cooprider, the choosing of the name, which was taken from
a list of geographical terms in an old-time spelling-book. The name
means, literally, the burg that is in the middle, or half way between points.
What points, if any, were in mind at the time of the naming does not now
appear. The original town-site comprised 64 lots—8 blocks of 8 lots
each—of which Main and Jackson are the principal streets, Kossuth Road
and Jackson street being the same thoroughfare. To this site additions
were made from time to time, but not by survey and plat, additional lots
and strips, as sold by the proprietor, having been defined by metes and
bounds. However, the Weaver addition of 1872, on the southeast, was
regularly surveyed and platted. This town stands upon what is known
as the “Sand Hill,” an elevation of peculiar formation—a mound of
several hundred acres of sand of irregular outline, on a base and margin
of clay, the summit a hundred feet above the surrounding level. Prior
to the building of the macadamized roads, the town could not be ap-
proached from any point of the compass without a heavy pull through
deep sand.
    For the first eighteen years of its history Middlebury was without a
postoffice. In 1854, within the time of Clinton M. Thompson’s service
as postmaster at Bowling Green, four postoffices were granted on his
recommendation—Center Point and Martz, in Clay county, and Pat-
ricksburg and Alligator, in Owen county, of which details are given
under the head of “Reminiscences.”
    The postmasters at Martz (Middlebury) have been George Jett,
Absalom Briley, James Moody, Jacob J. Baker, Melancthon Stull, John
W.  Sutton, Frank Brothers, J. B. Collins, and James F. Lankford. On
the first of May, 1907, after a period of fifty-three years, the office was
discontinued, supplanted by rural delivery, routes number 2 and out from
Clay City. During the extended length of time for which James Moody
held the office, about twenty years, the mails were handled by a number
of deputies, of whom may be named Jacob J. Baker, Eli Cooprider,
William H. Long, John Fair, Smith Auld, 0. P. Strother, G. W. Ellen-
berger.