James W. Drum, who designed the old Indiana County Courthouse across the street, was the architect of this building, whose date of 1880 is prominently displayed in a disk at the top. A walking tour of Philadelphia Street published forty years ago mentions that the building “had Indiana’s first large display windows.” Back in 1986 it was a hardware store; since then the ground floor has been restored to look much more properly Victorian.
On a recent visit to Indiana (Pennsylvania), a city on the periphery of the Greater Pittsburgh metropolitan area, old Pa Pitt was both disappointed and delighted to find the old Indiana County Courthouse shrouded in scaffolding—disappointed because it meant he could not get a clear picture of the building, but delighted because it meant that the building is getting the loving care it deserves. It was finished in 1870; the architect was James W. Drum, who designed several other prominent buildings in Indiana. The gilded cupola is the distinctive feature of the Indiana skyline, and the clock keeps the correct time.
