Pete Buttigieg spent more time in the national news than any Indiana mayor in recent memory. His time in the spotlight meant that South Bend, the city that bestowed Pete’s former title, was too. TV pundits wrote the city off like it was some backwoods village, but South Bend’s got some heft to it. Along with two historic courthouses, the city’s home to a big, modern, one.
I get it. South Bend isn’t Chicago or New York, and I’m not some hillbilly rube looking at a tall building in stuporous astonishment. But the United States Geological Survey recognizes 35,000 cities and towns and 19,249 of them have municipal governments. If we’re on the hunt for actual cities and remove those with fewer than 10,000 residents, we’re down to 4,000 as recognized by the USGS1. That’s a lot; about eighty per state if they were distributed evenly.
South Bend’s population of 101,860 means it ranks it as the country’s 306th-largest city. That’s enough people to put it in the 93rd percentile based on my arbitrary criteria. If you’re still unsure about South Bend’s size, go see for yourself: you’ll find a real, honest-to-goodness skyline with eight buildings that top a hundred feet. Jutting up 196 feet, South Bend’s County-City Building is the second tallest. It’s also the focus of this post.
The original seat of St. Joseph County was planned to be at the town of St. Joseph, located at “the portage of the St. Joseph and Kankakee Rivers2” as designated by the state legislature. The government moved to South Bend by 1832, and a brick courthouse was built two years later. It stood until 1854.
Although new courthouses were built in 1855 and 18983, county officials were ready for a dedicated city-county building as early as 19264. A variety of issues held up construction for a combined building, though, until something changed in the mid-1960s. A few disagreements still lingered, but officials solidified their plans in 1967, and a new County-City Building was coming to South Bend.
Initial drawings by architects Maurer, Van Ryn, Ogden, & Natali, Inc. called for a 14-story skyscraper and jail built from aluminum, glass, limestone, and brick. The new jail was planned to take up the building’s basement and extend to its fourth floor, but the tower was planned to contain city and county offices with a mayor’s suite at the top5.
Building everything and refurbishing the 1898 courthouse was anticipated to cost St. Joseph County $8.9 million. Officials only had $6.9 million, but 21-year bonds covered the shortfall, and 100 participants with gold-covered shovels broke ground for the project on May 6, 1967. Nine high school marching bands played at the commencement, which featured a speech by the chairman of the local Chamber of Commerce.
Downtown businesses were in complete support of the new skyscraper, and Robertson’s Department Store was particularly vocal. “We urge everyone to attend this [groundbreaking] ceremony,” the stalwart retailer said in a prominent newspaper ad, “for we feel that this new County-City Building is more than just a new building.”
“It is the symbol of every man’s faith in the growth of South Bend and the catalyst which will spark further building and rebuilding. Robertson’s looks forward with the rest of our community to the great expectations turned up by these first spades of earth6.”
As grand as their sentiment was, Robertson’s copywriters seemed earnest in their optimism. Many around town shared their opinion as a sliver of hope to cling to during a turbulent decade. Until the early 1960s, more than half of South Bend’s jobs were in manufacturing7.
Disaster struck in 1963 when Studebaker ended automobile production at its sprawling campus there, which ushered in a period of economic downturn. According to the Census, more than 30,000 people have left South Bend since 1960, nearly a quarter of its peak population! Had they stayed, South Bend would today be the 210th-largest city in the US instead of the 306th.
In the face of that economic collapse, The County-City Building project ushered in substantial new development downtown. Soon after it was topped out in 1968, another 14-story building -the St. Joseph (and later Key) Bank Tower- was erected. The following year, Robertson’s paid for another ad that read, “Our new County-City Building will serve as a symbol of the Downtown South Bend that is to be -thanks to the imagination, ingenuity, and not so common common sense of dedicated people8.”
By November of 1969, the first nine floors of the County-City Building and jail were ready for occupancy. Areas on the sixth and ninth floors of the new building were temporarily converted to courtrooms so the 1898 courthouse could be renovated. For two years, the County-City Building served as the St. Joseph County Courthouse, which qualifies it to be listed here under my courthouse category.
Robertson’s probably rhapsodized again in 1970, when the 25-story American National Bank tower was finished. Three new skyscrapers helped stanch the city’s bleeding as best they could, but other efforts like the disastrous River Bend Plaza project that turned five blocks of Michigan Street into a pedestrian mall failed spectacularly9. By the early 1980s, one of downtown South Bend’s staunchest supporters faced a downtown that couldn’t return the favor, and Robertson’s closed in 1982.
The rest of the County-City Building was finally completed shortly after Chase Tower. The courts returned to the revamped courthouse in November of 1971, ceding their spaces to the county’s health and welfare departments10. Shortly after construction finished, it became obvious that the jail was too small. After several expansions, it was finally relocated in 2001.
Although two historic courthouses sit right next to the modern skyscraper, the County-City Building is important in its own right. For starters, 2023 marks the structure’s 56th birthday, which puts it well within the limits of consideration for the National Register of Historic Places. Secondly, the tower is one of just three county courthouses in Indiana constructed in the International style of architecture.
Finally, the building has served as St. Joseph County’s Courthouse 3 since 2015, when portions of the first and second floor of the old jail were remodeled to take on the Criminal Division of the St. Joseph County Superior Court11.
To say nothing of its 1855 and 1898 courthouses, I’m pleased that South Bend and St. Joseph County continue to maintain the County-City Building and allowed it to be repurposed for its present-day use several years ago. It’s rare to see a county with three active courthouses built across 112 years.
TL;DR
St.Joseph County (pop.363,014, 5/92)
South Bend (pop. 101,860)
Built: 1971
Cost: $8.9 million ($52.7 million in 2016)
Architect: Maurer, Van Ryn, Ogden, & Natali
Style: International
Courthouse Square: Shelbyville Square
Height: 196 feet
Current Use: County offices
Photographed: 3/19/16 and 5/26/20
Sources Cited
1 “How many cities or towns are there in the United States?” Colleen Wren. Quora. February 8, 2018. Web. Retrieved 9/19/19.
2 Enyart, David. “St. Joseph County” Indiana County Courthouse Histories. ACPL Genealogy Center, 2010-2018. Web. Retrieved 9/18/19.
3 “A Look Back: 1855 Courthouse in South Bend has had many uses” The South Bend Tribune [South Bend]. April 2, 2018. Web. Retrieved 9/18/19.
4 “Groundbreaking Ceremony Held” The South Bend Tribune [South Bend]. May 6, 1967. 1. Print.
5 “Officials Approve County-City Plans” The South Bend Tribune [South Bend]. March 6, 1967. 9. Print.
6 Men at Work Community on the Move” The South Bend Tribune [South Bend]. May 5, 1967. 18. Print.
7 Indiana Business Review “South Bend/Mishawaka – Elkhart/Goshen.” Web. Retrieved 9/18/19.
8 “Dear South Bend” The South Bend Tribune [South Bend]. December 11, 1969. 22. Print.
9 “A Look Back at River Bend Plaza” The South Bend Tribune [South Bend]. March 7, 2016. Web. Retrieved 9/18/19.
10 “County Units Set to Move” The South Bend Tribune [South Bend]. October 24, 1969. 4. Print.
11 “New magistrates could speed up justice for victims in St. Joseph County” WSBT 22 [South Bend]. 5/12/15. Web. Retrieved 5/29/20.
South Bend has _another_ courthouse: the Frederick Juvenile Justice Center just off S. Michigan. My mom was a clerk there for a long time.
also: It weirded me out for years to hear “city county building” down here in Indy after growing up in SB.