Howe, IN

Howe is an unincorporated census-designated place in Lima Township, LaGrange County, at the meeting of State Roads 9 and 120, two miles south of the Indiana Toll Road. The place began in 1834 as Mongoquinong, a Potawatomi name for the prairie, then became Lima before taking the name of attorney John B. Howe. It once served as LaGrange County seat, and the historic buildings around the old center include the Howe Military School Rectory, St. James Memorial Chapel, the Lima Township School, and the Star Milling and Electric Company district. Those landmarks make Howe's early county-seat and school-town roles easy to picture.

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The former Howe Military School, founded in 1884, closed in 2019; its campus is now privately owned and the buildings are closed to general visitors. Outside that property, the Pigeon River marks the south side, while nearby Pine Knob Park and Duff Memorial Park on Cedar Lake add the outdoor geography of northern LaGrange County. Howe is small, but its identity is layered: Potawatomi prairie name, county-seat past, military-school campus, and a crossroads between the lake country and the toll road.