Traders Point

Traders Point is a residential area located on Lafayette Road, north of 71^st Street, in northwest Marion County. In 1864, John Jennings and Josiah Coughran built a mill at the point where Eagle Creek meets Lafayette Road. 

The settlement may have been named for an old Native American trading post or because it was a convenient place for farmers to trade livestock. Later, two groceries, a sawmill, a cooper’s shop, stockyards, and a blacksmith shop were built.

The area retained its rural character into the 20^th century. In 1940, Traders Point counted only 50 residents. Later, affluent Indianapolis families built large homes and country estates in the area. They used the hills and valleys along Eagle Creek between 56^th Street and 96^th as territories for fox hunts fashioned after those in which several of them had participated in Virginia. The group established Traders Point Hunt in 1934, and at the same time it was officially recognized by the Master of the Foxhound Association of America.

Business in the community suffered when Lafayette Road (U.S. 52) was widened and improved for motor traffic in 1935. Some of the older firms declined and were replaced by a service station and restaurants. Then, when Eagle Creek Reservoir was constructed in the 1960s, the area was deemed to be in the floodplain, and the few remaining commercial structures were leveled.

In addition to Traders Point Hunt, the Traders Point Hunt Charity Horse Show was an annual event held a few miles away in southern Boone County, benefiting the Humane Society of Indianapolis. These two organizations perpetuated the Traders Point name. The horse show was discontinued in 2015, and Trade Point Hunt disbanded in 2018. Nevertheless, several groups in the Eagle Creek area, including Traders Point Christian Church (a mega church that has expanded to five different Indianapolis locations), still use the Traders Point name.