The Bloomington Central Business District is a

historic district A historic district or heritage district is a section of a city which contains older buildings considered valuable for historical or architectural reasons. In some countries or jurisdictions, historic districts receive legal protection from c ...

in downtown Bloomington,

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...

. The district includes roughly twelve square blocks of the city and encompasses 140 buildings, 118 of which are

contributing building In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distric ...

s to the district's historic character. The 1901 McLean County Courthouse, the center of government of McLean County, is the focal point of the district. The other buildings in the district were built between 1842 and 1942 and are primarily commercial. The Miller-Davis Law Buildings, two of the oldest buildings in the district, were built in 1843 and represent the early period of Bloomington's development. Bloomington's commercial core grew rapidly during the 1850s and 1860s after two railroads opened in the city; while the 1854 Gridley Bank is the only surviving pre-1857 building from this period, several more remain from the later part of the boom. The city continued to grow, and its business district continued to expand, from 1860 until 1900; however, a fire destroyed much of its downtown in 1900. Several buildings in the district date from the rebuilding period of the early 1900s. The district was added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

on February 28, 1985.

References

{{National Register of Historic Places Bloomington–Normal Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Illinois National Register of Historic Places in McLean County, Illinois Commercial buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Illinois