South Whitley
Indiana
South Whitley is older than the county it sits in. In eighteen thirty-seven Joseph Parrett had lots surveyed and platted on the north bank of the Eel River, and he named the town Springfield.
That same year a post office opened, but because Indiana already had a Springfield, the postal department named it Whitley instead. Later, when the county seat got a post office of its own, this one was renamed South Whitley, and the name has held ever since. Remember, Whitley County itself was not organized until eighteen thirty-eight, which makes this town and its post office a year older than the county.
Education took root just as fast. In eighteen thirty-seven David Parrett opened a school in a log cabin on the riverbank, near where the State Street bridge crosses the Eel today, one of the first schools in the county.
