page_title: Fountain Square, Indianapolis
section_title: Decline
hierarchical_section_title: Fountain Square, Indianapolis / History / Decline
caption_attribution_description: English: Buildings on the southeastern (left) and southwestern (right) corners of the intersection of State and Prospect Streets in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States. These buildings are part of the State and Prospect District, a historic district that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
context_page_description: Fountain Square is one of seven designated cultural districts in Indianapolis, Indiana. Located right outside the city's downtown district, Fountain Square is home to three designated national historic districts, the Laurel and Prospect, the State and Prospect, and the Virginia Avenue districts, all of which were listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983. The neighborhood derives its name from the successive fountains that have been prominently featured at the intersection of Virginia Avenue, East Prospect Street, and Shelby Street.
  Fountain Square is the first commercial historic district in Indiana, and it is the only portion of the city outside the initial mile square that has continually operated as a recognized commercial area, dating back to the 1870s. Its significance is not only as an early commercial district, but also as one that was developed and dominated by German-American immigrants, merchants, and entrepreneurs, who established a strong German character on the city's southside. From the 1920s to the 1950s, Fountain Square was the city's main entertainment district, with as many as seven theaters in operation at one point in time.
context_section_description: However, the next decade saw the beginning of Fountain Square's demise, as newer more modern developments further south took over Fountain Square's role as the southside's commercial district. The closing of all of the theaters exacerbated its economic and cultural demise. Symbolically, the fountain from which Fountain Square received its name was removed in 1954 due to traffic concerns, to be returned in 1969 during a wave of revitalization efforts.
  During the 1960s, Indianapolis, along with the rest of the United States, experienced a great amount of societal upheaval, exacerbated by white flight after construction of the Interstate Highway System enabled many Americans to leave their industrial cities for new housing and shopping options in the suburbs. In particular, the construction of the I-65 and I-70 interchanges from 1968 to 1971 had a negative effect on Fountain Square's population totals, as many of the neighborhood's multi-level flats and apartments were cleared to make way for the highway. In all, over 17,000 residents were displaced from the downtown areas, 6,000 of which came from Fountain Square itself, totaling 25 percent of the neighborhood's population.
  In effect, this had cut Fountain Square's inhabitants off from downtown's social services and the adjacent neighborhoods, further exacerbating its population decline. By 1970, its population was an estimated 19,736, a decline of over 24 percent compared to the previous decade. At that time, the minority population had risen to 6 percent. For the next few decades, Fountain Square's population continued to decline, to 15,941 in 1980—a drop of almost 20 percent as compared to 1970 levels.
caption: The State and Prospect District, among two others located within Fountain Square, was recognized as a historic district in 1983.
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