A small town in Indiana with a history that dates back to 1851 when President Millard Fillmore granted land to Dr. George P. Story is for sale.
With Dr. Story's new medical practice, others soon followed to farm the land, harvest the acres of trees, and opened stores, a school, a church and post office. The town thrived in the early 20th century. However with railroad and highway expansion that bypassed the area, a man-made lake that cut Story off from next-door Bloomington where Indiana University is located, and the Great Depression, the town eventually fell on hard times. Today, it is prosperous again attracting tourists from nearby Indianapolis, Louisville and Cincinnati for its gourmet farm-to-table restaurant, bed-and-breakfast, saw and grain mills and neighboring 15,776-acre Brown County State Park famous for its fall colors. Also a friendly ghost known as the Blue Lady. Now for sale, Story is priced at $3.8 million.
During its heyday, Dr. Story’s town became one of the most popular places in southern Indiana, largely due to its well-stocked general store. Farmers and their families would come to peruse dry goods and the newest farm implements, take care of their blacksmithing needs, see the doctor, take their grain to the grist mill, and attend services at the local church. When the state government started buying up farmland around the time of the Great Depression for Brown County State Park, farmers were happy to leave. It had been a hard life trying to work the hilly, rocky land.
The general store, however, kept the town viable until 1950 and continued to stay open with diminishing trade through the 1970s. Since 1978, the town has had two owners and a year-round spirit, the Blue Lady, seen occasionally by employees and guests of the bed-and-breakfast portion of the Story Inn. Today, former residents’ homes have been turned into guest houses, the old general store is now a popular regional restaurant with creaky wooden floors and pot-bellied stove and the big barn is a favorite wedding venue.
Be mayor of your own Indiana town surrounded by state parks for guests to explore by foot or on horseback, where they can spend the night, have breakfast, lunch and dinner in one of the most charming spots in the Midwest. And who knows? You might even get to see the Blue Lady, trailing blue ribbons in her wake. Story, Indiana is now for sale, priced at $3.8 million and is listed by Christopher Cockerham of Bloomington Realtors, Bloomington, Indiana.
Photo credit: Michelle Pemberton
