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History · Advance

Advance dates to 1820, and 47% of its homes were built before 1940

Below: maps from 1909 on and the census since 1910.

1820founded
0on the National Register
47%homes built before 1940
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Photo: ONUnicorn · CC BY-SA 4.0
Quick answers

How Advance began

When was Advance founded?

1820

Advance dates its founding to 1820 (Wikidata). The census first counted it in 1910.

First census: 416 in 19102020 census: 503206 years
Founding year: Wikidata. First post office: 1873.The full story ↓

What stands out about Advance’s past

Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.

A history waiting to be writtenNo old photos of Advance are in the public archives yet. The rest are in attics and albums.Old housesHalf of Advance’s homes were built before 1943.Mapped building by building3 fire insurance maps, 1909 to 1919, drew every building in Advance.Deep rootsEstablished in 1820: 206 years of Advance.
★ What stands out · Help out

Start Advance’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Advance’s history is told.

Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
0 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
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The story

How Advance came to be

From Wikipedia’s history of Advance.

Read it all →

The first settlers arrived in the 1820s. Advance was officially incorporated in 1858 when residents requested formal recognition as a legal polity by the Indiana General Assembly. The town was platted in 1872 and was originally called "Osceola;" however, there was already a town of that name in the state, and so the name of Advance was chosen "in anticipation of the advancement which the coming of the Midland Railway would bring to the community". One of the few streets in town, Wall Street, was named after Joe Wall whose family owned over 2,000 acres (8.1 km2) surrounding the town until 1971.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

Every building

Advance, building by building, 1909–1919

Fire insurance maps drew every building, what it was made of and what it was used for, so insurers could price the risk of fire. Pick a year, then a sheet.

Advance fire insurance map, 1909, sheet 11909Sheet 1 of 1
Edition
Sheets
BrickWoodStone

Sanborn Map Company, via the Library of Congress. Editions published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.

By decade

Advance, decade by decade

Today1 recent
Advance Post office and Municipal offices2020Advance Post office and Municipal offices
People over time

Advance, census by census

0100200300400500600192019401960198020002020Peak: 562

Between 358 and 562 people in every census since 1910.

12 censuses, 1910–2020.

U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Advance’s Wikipedia page.

Questions about Advance’s history

What year was Advance founded?

In 1820, according to Wikidata. Advance’s post office opened in 1873, and the census of 1910 counted 416 people here.

Memory lane

What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.

Town Square →
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Sources

Where this page comes from

Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →

From Wikimedia Commons (1), Wikipedia, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and Sanborn fire insurance maps (Library of Congress). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.