Mail Order Lockups - 10 Elm Street

You might think this quaint-looking, Queen Anne-style building was designed to be the residence of some wealthy Montpelier family, but in fact it was purpose-built in 1900 as a jail house. It was an early example of a pre-fabricated kit, obtained by mail-order from the Pauly Jail Building Company, which is still going strong out in Noblesville, Illinois. This wasn’t the first jail built on Elm Street. It was commissioned when the deterioration of the original jail reached such a state of decay that it was judged unfit for habitation, even by prisoners. At this time, the Pauly company was putting up state-of-the-art, steel-cage facilities all over the country and many of their turn-of-the-century designs have the same, rather grand and whimsically decorative architecture as this one. It gives the buildings a more welcoming aspect than anyone would really expect to find in a jail, but its residential appearance might also be because in those days the jailer and his family usually lived on site.

Birthplace of Our Farmers Market
The jail closed in the early 70s and eventually, the county sheriff’s department moved in. The parking lot here was also the first home of our Farmers Market. The markets really started taking off throughout the country during the early 1990s, but ours has been a Saturday morning since 1977. It's moved locations several times over recent years, so best to ask a local where it currently resides. Let’s go a few steps further up the street, where we’ll get a look at the site of the city’s original jail, and I will tell you the riveting story of a honeymoon that ended in murder.