Caleb Mills – author of the free school bill of Indiana, State Superintendent of Public Instruction, first professor at Wabash College James Atwell Mount – Governor of Indiana from 1897–1901 Kenyon Nicholson – playwright and screenwriter Meredith Nicholson – author (The House of a Thousand Candles, A Hoosier Chronicle), politician, diplomat Robert B. F. Peirce – U.S. Representative (1881–83) Allen Saunders – cartoonist, wrote Steve Roper, and Mary Worth Ferdinand Louis Schlemmer – artist Will Shortz – The New York Times puzzle writer Maurice Thompson – author, poet, naturalist, State Geologist, popularized archery as a sport William Wheeler Thornton – author, State Supreme Court librarian, Indiana Deputy Attorney General, Crawfordsville City Attorney Randal Turner – opera singer; baritone Dick Van Dyke – actor, briefly attended Tuttle Middle School in Crawfordsville Lew Wallace – Union general in the Civil War and author of Ben-Hur; Governor of New Mexico Territory from 1878 to 1881; served as U.S. Minister to the Ottoman Empire from 1881 to 1885; resided in Crawfordsville; attended Wabash College. Susan Wallace – author and poet, wife of Lew Wallace Maurine Dallas Watkins – author of Chicago; Hollywood screenwriter Howdy Wilcox – Indianapolis 500 racing pioneer, winner of the 1919 Indy 500 Mary Holloway Wilhite (1831–1892) – physician and philanthropist Henry Lane Wilson – U.S. diplomat and Ambassador to Mexico, son of James Wilson James Wilson – politician, United States Representative from Indiana and United States Ambassador to Venezuela John L. Wilson – politician, United States Representative and Senator from Washington, son of James Wilson Footnotes External links City of Crawfordsville Community Profile Crawfordsville District Public Library Crawfordsville Star, Google news archive. —PDFs of 1,180 issues, dating from 1872 through 1898. Daily News-Review, Google news archive. —PDFs of 1,050 issues, dating from 1900 through 1903. Crawfordsville Review, Google news archive. —PDFs of 765 issues, dating from 1911 through 1928. Cities in Indiana Micropolitan areas of Indiana Cities in Montgomery County, Indiana County seats in Indiana 1834 establishments in Indiana Indianapolis metropolitan area