The Chesterton Commercial Historic District is a historic district

Historic district (United States)

In the United States, a historic district is a group of buildings, properties, or sites that have been designated by one of several entities on different levels as historically or architecturally significant. Buildings, structures, objects and sites within a historic district are normally divided...

 in Chesterton, Indiana

Chesterton, Indiana

Chesterton is a town in Westchester, Jackson and Liberty townships, Porter County, Indiana, United States. The population was 13,068 at the 2010 census. The three towns of Chesterton, Burns Harbor, and Porter are known as the tri-towns or the Duneland area....

.

Originally called Coffee Creek and located a little to the south of the current downtown, the name was changed some time after the post office

Post office

A post office is a facility forming part of a postal system for the posting, receipt, sorting, handling, transmission or delivery of mail.Post offices offer mail-related services such as post office boxes, postage and packaging supplies...

 was established in 1833 to Calumet

Calumet River

The Calumet River refers to a system of heavily industrialized rivers and canals in the region between the neighborhood of South Chicago in Chicago, Illinois, and the city of Gary, Indiana.-Background:...

, the river to the north. When the Lake Shore and Michigan Railroad came through the area in 1852, the town moved north to the current location and began to develop. The town's name was not changed to Chesterton until after the Civil War

American Civil War

The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

. There appears to have been confusion with Calumet, Illinois

Calumet, Illinois

Calumet, Illinois may refer to the following place:*Calumet City, Illinois*Calumet Park, Illinois*Calumet Township, Cook County, Illinois*Calumet River...

, further up the track.

The town’s location along the railroad helped industry to grow. Soon, there was a cooperage, sawmills, a washing machine factory, and an organ company. Among the better examples of the towns growth are the commercial building on the southwest corner of Broadway and Calumet Rd, and the old Chesterton Tribune Building.

Key buildings

South of Broadway on the west side of Calumet Road are two historic buildings.

• I.O.O.F Lodge - The International Order of Odd Fellows Lodge was built c. 1905, shortly after the devastating fire of 1902.
• The Queen Anne
  Queen Anne Style architecture
  The Queen Anne Style in Britain means either the English Baroque architectural style roughly of the reign of Queen Anne , or a revived form that was popular in the last quarter of the 19th century and the early decades of the 20th century...
  
  Commercial building on the southwest corner of Broadway and Calumet Road was built c. 1895. This building is considered a ‘notable’ property which substantially supports the historic integrity of the district.

The bulk of the historic district in on the east side of Calumet Road. The southern end of the district starts across from Indiana Ave. It runs north to the tracks.

• The Chesterton Tribune Building is the most southern building and was built c. 1905 after the great fire of 1902. It is considered a Twentieth Century function style, similar to most of the buildings in the district.
• The Smith Block was also built c.1905.
• The Hoham Block is two buildings to the north and is also a c.1905 Twentieth Century Functional style.
• The intermediate buildings in this row are commercial buildings of either Nineteenth Century (c.1900) or Twentieth Century (c.1920, 1910, 1905).
• The last ‘notable’ building is the Chesterton City Hall, c. 1902, located adjacent to the railroad.