alternatehistory.com

As some of you may or may not know, I am a lifelong Hoosier, a resident of Indiana. I have lived in this state for my entire life so far, and hope to keep it that way if possible. I am finishing up a history degree in Indianapolis, and am thus deeply engaged in all facets of my state's history.

Any fellow Hoosiers among you will know full well that Indianapolis was not the state's first capital. Vincennes, located in the state's southwest, was the capital from the establishment of Indiana Territory until 1813. In that year, the territory's general assembly moved the capital to Corydon, at present a somewhat-small town along the Ohio River. When Indiana became a state in 1816, Corydon became the state's first capital. However, as a result of provisions within the Enabling Act (which, as the name suggests, enabled Hoosier legislators to draft the new state's constitution), Congress mandated that the Indiana General Assembly eventually locate a new capital in federal land in the new state's north. This mandate was met in 1825 when the new city of Indianapolis was dedicated as the state's capital; it has remained such to this day.

I spent the vast majority of life in very small town in southern Indiana, just a twenty minute drive from Corydon. I remember trips I took in elementary school to the Corydon Capitol State Historic Site, which is when I first heard about this relocation of the capital city. Since then, I've been incredibly interested in answering this question: what if that relocation never happened? What if Corydon remained the capital to this day? How could such an unlikely event occur, and what would its ramifications be nationally or even globally? Obviously this change would have a major impact on the course of Indiana history, and this timeline will go into great detail about that. But I am firmly of the belief that every event in history, in some small way, is connected to all those events that came after. Keeping Corydon the capital would have incredibly small ripples in comparison to, say, my other timeline (link in signature). But it would have ripples nonetheless, and those ripples, as time goes on, could be incredibly significant.

This timeline is not meant to replace my other timeline; I will still be working on both. However, "Hoosier Hysteria" will have a much smaller scope (at least initially) than "His Truth is Marching On," so I should be able to manage both, especially now that my formal education is almost at an end. So if you folks are interested in a timeline which delves more into local- and state-level history than the vast majority of timelines on this forum, stick around and watch the ripples spread.
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