Our Indianapolis office is in the Blacherne Building on the northwest corner of Meridian and Vermont streets. The building was built by General Lew Wallace; retired civil war general, provincial governor, United States ambassador and author. He enjoyed the help of his son, attorney Henry Lane Wallace. General Wallace is well-known in Crawfordsville Indiana where his study and related museum are located.
Completed in 1895, the building was one of the first multi-story rental properties in the city with an elevator. The building project was financed with the proceeds from General Wallace’s novel Ben Hur. His other two novels, The Fair God (published 1886) and The Prince of India (published 1893) were less successful.
It is a pleasure to work in a grand building built in the nineteenth century. We affectionately refer to our office space, which once included the coal shuttle and elevator drive, as “Lew’s Basement.”