View source for Dusting Off the Old Ones (16)

'''16. Custer County's First Court House'''

We wonder how many readers of the local paper realize that the pleasing structure across the street from the Clarke Insurance Service office is Custer County's third Court House. Well, it is, according to the records and files in the author's office, the first court house was located on the present site of Jack Joyce's barber shop and the next building to the west. The first jail was across the alley from the north end of the barber shop where Cotton's Second Hand Store now stands. In 1881, the County Commissions made a trade with a man by the name of Luther J. Whitney. Whitney was a squatter and claimed 80 acres of land, the northeast corner of which is the corner of Montana Avenue and Leighton Boulevard. In the trade, the commissioners got the present court house site. However, the commissioners had to buy the site again and this time from the Northern Pacific Railroad Company, as it was discovered that the land was included in the original grant to the Northern Pacific. In 1882, a building was built which lasted until 1948. Work was started on the present courthouse in 1948 and it was occupied in December, 1949.