Project Scroll Research Note 2026-10: Mishawaka before Mishawaka: the post-office name of 1833

The county histories date the Mishawaka post office to the spring of 1834 and treat the name as one given to a town first platted, on 15 July 1833, as St. Joseph Iron Works. A letter from the first postmaster shows that the name came first. Writing to Senator John Tipton on 4 September 1833, under the heading "Mishawaka, St Joseph Iron Works," Henry Yerrington explained that on 9 May 1833 he had applied, through the Detroit postmaster, "for the establishment of a Post office at this place by the name of 'Mishawaka,'" because the settlers had to travel "four and some ten miles" to the office at South Bend. The editors of the Tipton Papers, citing the Indiana State Library's index of post offices, give the office's establishment as 11 December 1833, with Yerrington as postmaster, and the federal register of 1835 lists Mishawaka with Henry Yerrington and his successor Orlando Hurd. The name Mishawaka was thus in written use two months before the town was platted under another name, and seventy-six years before it was attached to the fictional "Princess Mishawaka."

Project Scroll Research Note 2026-10, version 1. The note sets out the record quoted, where it is held, what it changes, its limits, and what was searched before calling it new. Web version: projectscroll.com/discoveries/notes/2026-10/.