On an old Indian trail, widened by Mad Anthony Wayne and his army to make wagon travel possible between Fort Wayne and Goshen, now an hour or so trip that back then took about two days, Richard Stone built a two story building with plastered walls, planked wood floors and lots of windows.

And though it doesn’t sound like much, consider this, in 1839, the year Stone completed his tavern and inn, most of the people around what is now Ligonier in Noble County were living in one or two room log cabins with dirt floors. In other words, Stone’s tavern was luxurious indeed.

And, as befitting such a place, it became the centerpiece of the community – a meeting place for townspeople as well as functioning as a post office, jury room, dance hall, stage coach stop, a place for women to hold their quilting bees and even, at one time, a jail as prisoners were locked in several small rooms upstairs.