Founding year: the first Seelyville post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Seelyville’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Seelyville is more historic than 42% of U.S. towns. Its share of homes from before 1940 holds the grade up; its National Register listings pull it down.
C+
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Seelyville’s overall grade.
Indiana towns list more on the Register than most of the country (a typical Indiana town has 7.9 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Seelyville’s 0.0 sits below most of its state (22% of Indiana towns have fewer) while its 0 listings outnumber those of 23% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from D to B. The pre-1940 share is a Census survey estimate (±9.0 points). The founding year is the first post office, not a stated founding date.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Seelyville’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
Seelyville was originally called the "Woodsmills." The town was laid out by Moddisett, the owner of the land north of the Jonas Seely property. When the Terre Haute and Eastern Railroad was built along the south side of town, the small whistle stop station hired Jonas Seely as station master. The name was originally the Seely Station but was later changed to Seelyville Station. The town expanded with the opening of the McKeen coal shaft, one of the earliest operated in the county. After passing through several hands, the mine closed operations in 1879. Others operated into the early 1900s. A post office was established in Seelyville in 1878.
Passages that mention Seelyville, cut from the printed page as they were published.
History of Vigo county, Indiana1891 · page 479Read the page →
Read the text
Seelyville is a post-office and station on the Van road, in Lost Creek township, east of Terre Haute nine miles. The place came into existence by the opening of a coal bank, one of the earliest oper¬ ated in the county — the McKeen coal shaft. After passing through several hands, the mines closed operations in 1879. The town was laid out by J. Seeley. H. C. Dickerson opened the first store here in 1878, and about this time a post-office was established.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
Timeline
Seelyville, 1867 to 1980
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
The Seelyville post office opened in 1867, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
How does Seelyville rank for history?
Seelyville is more historic than 42% of U.S. towns. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
How old are the homes in Seelyville?
23% of Seelyville’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±9.0 points), against a typical 14% for an Indiana town; the median home was built in 1961.
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).
From Wikimedia Commons (3), Wikipedia, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
2020
2020
2020
