201 First Street NE Austin , MN - View Map: The first courthouse
to be built in Austin was completed in 1868, 11 years after
Austin became the county seat of Mower County. The building cost
$6,450. Eleven years later, the village of Ramsey made an
unsuccessful attempt to secure the county seat. This may have
led to the next Mower County Courthouse, built in Austin in
1884. The building, shown above in 1914, was three stories of
red brick built over a high limestone basement in the Italianate
style. A turreted Roman Renaissance and narrow dome rose above
the central pavilion, whose one-story columned portico was
approached by a grand flight of stairs. The building cost
$64,817. Additions in 1952 and 1966 eventually became the
courthouse and the old building was demolished. The additions
are flat, rectangular, two-story buildings made of pink Kasota
limestone and gray Bedford stone from Indiana. The first
section, 59 by 121 feet, has deep horizontal bands of windows on
a long facade along the east side of the b