The first homestead claim in Howard County was filed on March 11, 1871. St. Paul was appointed the county seat in May and retained that status over Dannebrog in a close 1874 election. A wooden courthouse was built in St. Paul in 1877, but by June 1912 residents supported replacing what they called a leftover from the sod house and grasshopper period. Voters approved a $75,000 stone courthouse on the same site. Designed by Lincoln architect George Berlinghof, a German immigrant, the new building had its cornerstone laid on June 5, 1913. Financial difficulties caused sporadic construction, and when it opened in November 1914 it was $28,000 over budget. Though predominantly brick, the Classical Revival building features a foundation and columns of Indiana limestone, stairs of pale pink marble, railings of solid white marble, and terrazzo floors. The Grand Army of the Republic monument to Civil War veterans was dedicated on July 4, 1919, and the Howard County Courthouse was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1990.