Then and now
Goshen, 1861 and today
Goshen, the county seat of Elkhart County, Indiana, has a plan in the corner of the 1861 county map, coloured by its additions. Here it is laid over the streets of today. Fade between the two, or drag a line across and see one beside the other.
Other towns: Cassopolis · Niles · Dowagiac · Paw Paw · South Bend · Elkhart · all seven
Drag to move. Scroll, pinch or use the buttons to zoom. The old plan was lined up by hand on street corners that still carry their 1861 names, so it is close but not exact: expect it to be out by a few yards in places.
Things to look for
- The Court House square, between Third and Main. Fade to today: the courthouse still stands on it.
- Market Street, along the south side of the square. It is still there under another name. Fade to today and find what it is called now.
- Pearl Street at the south end of town. Today’s map spells it differently.
- The railroad crossing the north-east of town on its long diagonal, with the Depot Grounds and the passenger and freight depots.
- The race and Rock Run, the machine shop and the tannery beside them, and the Elkhart River on the west.
- The additions named for the men who laid them out: Barnes’s, Albright’s, Mayfield’s, Chamberlain’s and the rest. Each name is a lead to a plat in the county’s records.
How this was made
The plan is shown live from the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee Libraries’ image service, at full detail. Forty street corners that appear on both maps (Second, Third, Main, Fifth, Sixth and Seventh, where they meet Wilkinson, Pike, Clinton, Market, Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe and Pearl) were matched by measurement, and the plan was fitted to them, turning it a little over half a degree. On average the old corners land within about four yards of the new ones. Monroe Street jogs at Main on both maps, and each side was measured on its own. Where today’s Main Street bends away south of Monroe it was left out of the fit.
The business directory printed beside the plan has been left off this copy, though a few of its letters show at the left edge. The whole directory is on the full county map in the map room.
1861 plan: Map of Elkhart Co. Indiana (Philadelphia: Samuel Geil, 1861), published by Geil & Harley, inset “Goshen.” American Geographical Society Library, University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee Libraries. Public domain, shown live from the Library’s image service. Today’s aerial photograph and, once the challenge is solved, today’s names: USGS The National Map (public domain). Today’s streets and water drawn as lines: OpenStreetMap data, © OpenStreetMap contributors, available under the Open Database License.
The business directory printed beside this plan is in the roll of names: who was in Goshen in 1861 →