Crook County Courthouse - Prineville, Oregon
Posted by: 
Volcanoguy
N 44° 18.177 W 120° 50.645
10T E 671967 N 4907782
The Crook County Courthouse in Prineville, Oregon.
Waymark Code: WM36XD
Location: Oregon, United States
Date Posted: 02/19/2008
Views: 109
The first Crook County Courthouse was a one story wooden building at the corner of West 5th and Main Streets. A second wooden courthouse was built in 1885 but by 1905 it was considered unsafe. In 1909 a stone building was built of basalt quarried from a site located just west of the Ochoco Viewpoint, a mile to the west. Originally there were three sets of steps, but the east and west steps were bremoved in a remodel of the building in the 1940s. In the early 1990s the building was again remodeled to repair some structural problems with the building. The Bowman Museum (
visit link) offers summer tours of the building which include a visit to the clock tower. The clock is one of just two weight-driven tower clocks in Oregon, the other is in the Baker City Hall building.
Crook County was established on October 24, 1882 from the southern part of Wasco County and was named for U.S. Army Major-General George Crook. The county initially covered 8,600 square miles. In 1914, the northern part of the county became Jefferson County and in 1916, the western part of the county became Deschutes County. Today the county covers 2,986 square miles.