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Paris Chipman Dunning
Paris Chipman Dunning (March 15, 1806 – May 9, 1884), governor of the state of Indiana in 1849, was a Bloomington adopted son, having moved there with his mother and brother around 1824. He married Sarah Alexander on July 6, 1826, and they had six children: Martha, Mary, Rachel Josephine, Paris, James, and Alice.
Dunning represented Monroe County in the Indiana House of Representatives from 1833-1836, and Monroe and Brown Counties in the Indiana State Senate from 1836-1840. He then returned to Bloomington to practice law. In 1846, Dunning was elected Lieutenant Governor, and became governor when James Whitcomb resigned. He returned to his Bloomington law practice in 1849.
In 1854 he was nominated by the Democratic Party to run for the United States Congress, but declined the nomination, citing "slanders industriously circulated" by his enemies. (Dunning was rumored to have affairs with at least two women.) But he returned to the state senate in the 1860's as war broke out.
His wife Sarah died in 1863, and Dunning remarried widow Ellen Ashford on September 17, 1865. They had one son, Smith.
Dunning continued to practice law in Bloomington until his death on May 9, 1884, aged 78. He is buried in Rose Hill Cemetery
