Prior to the arrival of Pogue and McCormick, Native Americans and wildlife would often follow Pogue's Run as a pathway. George Pogue (c.1763–1821) was a
blacksmith from
Connersville, Indiana. In 1819, he blazed a trail that corresponds with the present-day Brookville Road. On March 2, 1819, he built a cabin for his family of seven where Michigan Street currently crosses Pogue's Run. However, there is some disagreement among historians about these events;
Jacob Piatt Dunn wrote in his 1910 work
Greater Indianapolis, that Pogue actually arrived on March 2, 1820, and moved into a cabin that had been built in 1819 by a Ute Perkins, who had left before Pogue arrived. Perkins reportedly had left the area because of his loneliness, later settling in
Rush County, Indiana. The creek became known as Pogue's Run after Pogue disappeared in April 1821; it had been called Perkin's Run (after Ute Perkins) prior to Pogue's disappearance. , with Pogue's Run in the southeast section When Indianapolis was laid out, only Pogue's Run running diagonally across the southeast portion of the "
Mile Square" disturbed the orderliness of the grid pattern.
Alexander Ralston had to make compromises due to the stream's location within the congressional donation lands given for the future Indianapolis. Before the state government could be moved to Indianapolis from
Corydon, fifty dollars was spent to rid swampy Pogue's Run of the
mosquitoes that made it a "source of pestilence". In the so-called
Battle of Pogue's Run on May 20, 1863, during the
American Civil War, several
Democrats leaving the state party convention on the railroad running parallel to Pogue's Run threw various firearms and knives into the creek because
Union troops were looking for contraband weapons. Two decades later, in 1882, the stream flooded, killing at least ten people. A
covered bridge that once crossed Pogue's Run was eventually destroyed. By the early 1900s, the creek had become more of a nuisance than an asset to the city due to flooding, public health risks from diseases, and the unsightly and unpleasant smell due to years of sewage and industrial pollution. The contract for what became known as the "Pogue's Run Drain" or the "Pogue's Run Improvement" was awarded to the Dunn-McCarthy company of Chicago for their bid of $907,000, which was a few hundred thousand dollars less than the city engineer had projected, although the final cost was well over $1 million. The creek would enter a double-box culvert near New York and Pine streets on the east side of downtown and pass through downtown. The stream originally ran southwest after crossing Meridian Street south of the Mile Square and joined the river near what is now the intersection of Morris and West streets about further south. The project cut a new route more directly west to the river, thereby shortening Pogue's Run. Construction began on July 17, 1914, at the White River near McCarty Street. On June 5, 1916, the Board of Public Works reported the project was "practically finished", but construction continued until November of that year. In 1926, an addition to the drain was built for the section nearest the stream's outlet into White River. On the section immediately to the northeast of where Pogue's Run enters downtown Indianapolis, Spades Park and
Brookside Park were built to take advantage of the creek as a recreation opportunity. ==Today==