Aurora Depot

Site #3 on our tour is the Aurora Depot! This humble depot actually began as a two-room cabin which acted as both living quarters and trading post for Scottish immigrant, John Gillis. Mr. Gillis, after coming to American in 1756 and serving as a patriot in the Revolutionary War, wanted to find a place to settle and begin his new life. So he came to Aurora! Here, during the 1790’s, he constructed the two-room cabin in the same location that would eventually become the Aurora Depot. Fifty years later, the Ohio & Mississippi Railroad Depot was built. On April 4th, 1854, a Cincinnati train bound for Cochran, Indiana, made a stop at the depot and became the first train to pass through Aurora. The Depot remained in active service until 1916. During that period, the building was rebuilt and ownership changed two more times. Baltimore & Ohio South-Western took over in 1893, only to be replaced by the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad in 1899. The third reconstruction of the Depot building in 1916 gave us the brick walls and tiled roof that are so familiar to us today. This style of architecture, known as “arts and crafts,” is characterized by little ornamentation and low, end-gabled roofs with projecting eaves and exposed rafters. Today, the depot operates as part of the Aurora Public Library District and serves as a Local History Library, holding periodicals dating back to 1836, family histories, census figures, and a collection of books detailing the history of Aurora, Dearborn County, and the surrounding areas.

Source(s): City of Aurora Official Website

Links:

https://aurora.in.us/library-and-depot.html